A Place in the Sun
by Sheila B
Summary: Wesley goes to England to return his brother's ashes to their father. But someone has come to LA to find Wesley. Sequel
1. Default Chapter

Part 2  
  
  
An airport in England  
  


She hated her passport photo. It made her hair look sepia colored. And when your hair looks the color of the blackish green secretions of a cuttlefish and you're running for your life, it just makes your day that much worse. She stood by the magazines in the duty free shop, trying to look innoccent and inconspicous. The airport was crowded with holiday traffic, and one 17 year old girl in a dark blue Hereford School For Young Ladies blazer; with a blue and white plaid skirt and one small leather carry on was not going to be noticed.

Don't forget the kneesocks and the loafers.

One day she vowed to get revenge on whoever had designed the penny loafer. These shoes were not good for running at all. She would have much rather had some sneakers, or even a pair of Docs. But she had left directly from her last class of the day, on the bus, and the only possessions she had now were in that small leather carry on. A pair of pants and a shirt, a change of underwear, her toothbrush, hairbrush, washcloth and cleanser. Socks, her wallet (just cash, no credit cards) her diary, lipgloss. Stakes, a bottle of holy water, and a cross considerably larger than the one she wore around her neck.

She could do this. She would do this. They were not going to find her. They were not going to drag her back. She shuddered at the memories that rose up unbidden from some dark corner of her self. No more. No more locked closet doors. No more training. No more not being good enough for him.

No more wasting her youth and beauty for dumb stupid sodding destiny.

She had a place to go. She had someone who would take her in, protect her. He had done it for others, surely he would help her as well. After all, they were family.

Her intuition told her to turn around. She did, and saw them coming. Three big men, dressed in leather, advancing towards her with sick grins on their faces. She ran. They gave chase. She tried to lose herself in the crowd, fighting her way towards the starting gate. She put on a sudden burst of speed as she neared the entrance, slamming on the brakes just long enough to show her ticket to the stewardess before climbing the stairs.

A male voice boomed over the tannoy.

"Flight 215 to Los Angeles is now boarding at gate 10. Flight 215 to Los Angeles, California is now boarding at gate 10."

She slid into her window seat and leaned her head against the cushions.

Her heart was pounding in her chest.

*Oh god. She had done it. She had really done it.*

The young girl clutched at the delicate gold cross around her neck and wished on it.

"Please, God. Help me find Wesley."

******

Los Angeles, Califorina

Darla found Angel in his office later that evening. He had expected her to show up at some point. The ususal routine. One of them would start a fight, scream, throw things, stomp off, and then come back later with a present of some sort and everything would be all right again. Never appologizing. They didn't do appologies.

"How long has it been since you were in Ireland?" She asked.

"A hundred and 30 years at least. Why?"

"I spoke with a travel agent, he said they've got some good fares to Galway, hotels included. I thought, maybe you'd like to go with me."

"That would be nice." Angel said, a faraway look in his eyes.

"Good. I'll start packing." She touched his arm awkwardly. "Angel?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm sorry."

******

"David Nabbit wants to lend us one of his planes." said Angel, putting down the phone. "He's having it specially outfitted with dark curtains."

"That's incredibly generous of him." said Wesley.

"You mean, we're actually going to be loaded into a small metal tube and shot across the sky using only the power of highly explosive gas?" Darla asked nervously.

"It was your idea to go with them." Angel reminded her.

"It won't be that bad. "Cordelia said. "They have Valium now."

"Oh goody. So when we crash, I'll feel really relaxed about ceasing to exist."

"Actually, we probably shouldn't take any drugs." said Angel. "Remember what happened last time?"

Wesley and Cordelia grimaced.

"What happened last time?" Darla asked.

"Angel um - had a date with this actress, who slipped him a mickey that turned him back into Angelus."

"Wish I'd been there." Darla joked.

"Wes knocked him down the elevator shaft at our old office. Then we chained him to the bed until he turned back."

******

Sunnydale, California, same day

She got off the bus and stood looking around at the town.

So this was the famous "Hellmouth".

She knew her brother wasn't here, obviously. But perhaps she might find someone who could tell her where he had gone. Better start with the best source. She pulled the address out of her blazer pocket and marched off down the street.

Emma Wyndham-Pryce hoped that Mr. Rupert Giles was home. After all, it was growing dark, and nightime on the Hellmouth could hardly be safe for a young lady like herself.

"Hey little girl, need a ride somewhere?" A north London accent asked.

Suprised to hear a familiar sound so far from home, she stopped walking and turned to look at the speaker.

He was young, about 20-24, and thin, bone thin but muscular. Bleached blonde hair and wide blue eyes. His head was hanging out of the blacked out window of a junky brown Desoto.

"I'm not supposed to ride with strangers." She said, knowing it sounded babyish.

"Awww. Int'that cute. Really, babe. I don't bite." He laughed at what appeared to be a private joke. "And you'll be safer in this car that you would be on the street."

Emma hesitated.

*Daddy would certainly not approve.*

*Who cares what Daddy thinks. He's the one who siced those goons on you. To Hell with Daddy.*

"Okay." She said, and ran around to the passenger side.

  
Go to Part 3 


	2. Chapter 2

Part 2  
  
  
An airport in England  
  


She hated her passport photo. It made her hair look sepia colored. And when your hair looks the color of the blackish green secretions of a cuttlefish and you're running for your life, it just makes your day that much worse. She stood by the magazines in the duty free shop, trying to look innoccent and inconspicous. The airport was crowded with holiday traffic, and one 17 year old girl in a dark blue Hereford School For Young Ladies blazer; with a blue and white plaid skirt and one small leather carry on was not going to be noticed.

Don't forget the kneesocks and the loafers.

One day she vowed to get revenge on whoever had designed the penny loafer. These shoes were not good for running at all. She would have much rather had some sneakers, or even a pair of Docs. But she had left directly from her last class of the day, on the bus, and the only possessions she had now were in that small leather carry on. A pair of pants and a shirt, a change of underwear, her toothbrush, hairbrush, washcloth and cleanser. Socks, her wallet (just cash, no credit cards) her diary, lipgloss. Stakes, a bottle of holy water, and a cross considerably larger than the one she wore around her neck.

She could do this. She would do this. They were not going to find her. They were not going to drag her back. She shuddered at the memories that rose up unbidden from some dark corner of her self. No more. No more locked closet doors. No more training. No more not being good enough for him.

No more wasting her youth and beauty for dumb stupid sodding destiny.

She had a place to go. She had someone who would take her in, protect her. He had done it for others, surely he would help her as well. After all, they were family.

Her intuition told her to turn around. She did, and saw them coming. Three big men, dressed in leather, advancing towards her with sick grins on their faces. She ran. They gave chase. She tried to lose herself in the crowd, fighting her way towards the starting gate. She put on a sudden burst of speed as she neared the entrance, slamming on the brakes just long enough to show her ticket to the stewardess before climbing the stairs.

A male voice boomed over the tannoy.

"Flight 215 to Los Angeles is now boarding at gate 10. Flight 215 to Los Angeles, California is now boarding at gate 10."

She slid into her window seat and leaned her head against the cushions.

Her heart was pounding in her chest.

*Oh god. She had done it. She had really done it.*

The young girl clutched at the delicate gold cross around her neck and wished on it.

"Please, God. Help me find Wesley."

******

Los Angeles, Califorina

Darla found Angel in his office later that evening. He had expected her to show up at some point. The ususal routine. One of them would start a fight, scream, throw things, stomp off, and then come back later with a present of some sort and everything would be all right again. Never appologizing. They didn't do appologies.

"How long has it been since you were in Ireland?" She asked.

"A hundred and 30 years at least. Why?"

"I spoke with a travel agent, he said they've got some good fares to Galway, hotels included. I thought, maybe you'd like to go with me."

"That would be nice." Angel said, a faraway look in his eyes.

"Good. I'll start packing." She touched his arm awkwardly. "Angel?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm sorry."

******

"David Nabbit wants to lend us one of his planes." said Angel, putting down the phone. "He's having it specially outfitted with dark curtains."

"That's incredibly generous of him." said Wesley.

"You mean, we're actually going to be loaded into a small metal tube and shot across the sky using only the power of highly explosive gas?" Darla asked nervously.

"It was your idea to go with them." Angel reminded her.

"It won't be that bad. "Cordelia said. "They have Valium now."

"Oh goody. So when we crash, I'll feel really relaxed about ceasing to exist."

"Actually, we probably shouldn't take any drugs." said Angel. "Remember what happened last time?"

Wesley and Cordelia grimaced.

"What happened last time?" Darla asked.

"Angel um - had a date with this actress, who slipped him a mickey that turned him back into Angelus."

"Wish I'd been there." Darla joked.

"Wes knocked him down the elevator shaft at our old office. Then we chained him to the bed until he turned back."

******

Sunnydale, California, same day

She got off the bus and stood looking around at the town.

So this was the famous "Hellmouth".

She knew her brother wasn't here, obviously. But perhaps she might find someone who could tell her where he had gone. Better start with the best source. She pulled the address out of her blazer pocket and marched off down the street.

Emma Wyndham-Pryce hoped that Mr. Rupert Giles was home. After all, it was growing dark, and nightime on the Hellmouth could hardly be safe for a young lady like herself.

"Hey little girl, need a ride somewhere?" A north London accent asked.

Suprised to hear a familiar sound so far from home, she stopped walking and turned to look at the speaker.

He was young, about 20-24, and thin, bone thin but muscular. Bleached blonde hair and wide blue eyes. His head was hanging out of the blacked out window of a junky brown Desoto.

"I'm not supposed to ride with strangers." She said, knowing it sounded babyish.

"Awww. Int'that cute. Really, babe. I don't bite." He laughed at what appeared to be a private joke. "And you'll be safer in this car that you would be on the street."

Emma hesitated.

*Daddy would certainly not approve.*

*Who cares what Daddy thinks. He's the one who siced those goons on you. To Hell with Daddy.*

"Okay." She said, and ran around to the passenger side.

  
Go to Part 3 


	3. Chapter 3

Part 3  
  
  
Sunnydale, California  
  


Emma clutched at the shoulder belt in terror. This man was the worst driver she had ever had the displeasure of riding with. He never signaled, or stopped at stop signs, or obeyed any traffic laws at all.

"What are you doing in the States?" He asked casually.

"I could ask you the same question." She retorted primly.

"You don't want to know the answer."

"Neither do you."

"Alright then. Do you have a name, Little Miss Sticks Out Like A Sore Thumb?"

"Emma."

He swerved to avoid a cat. Not altogether successfully. Emma winced at the angry squeal she heard from under the tires.

"They call me Spike. I know the bloke you're look'n for, I can take ya right to'm."

"Much appreciated."

"Least I can do for a countrywoman. This town's not safe after dark."

He parked in front of a complex of Spainish style apartment buildings.

"Sorry, I can't walk you to the door." Spike said. "I'll wait til' you get inside, in case he's not home."

"Thank you very much for the ride." Said Emma, for some reason feeling herself starting to blush. He was very handsome, but with a hint of danger and excitment. Just the sort of boy she had always been ordered to stay away from. There was probably something horribly wrong with him.

******

"Mr. Rupert Giles?"

Giles peered at the small person addressing him. He'd just been woken up from a sound sleep.

"Don't tell me. You're Buffy's new watcher."

She blinked at him, then straightened her mouth into a serious, no nonsense frown.

"I hardly think so, Mr. Giles." Her speech was bizzarely formal for someone who looked about 17. She was willowy, dark haired and wearing a public school uniform. Quite beautiful, with huge blue eyes.

*Um - Miss, You're about 25 years too late.* He almost said. But by the way she was glaring at him, it was obviously not the erotic fantasy fairy coming to call.

"May I help you, Miss -?"

"Emma Wyndham-Pryce. And I need your assistance." She marched past him, into the flat and sat down on his couch. He closed the door and followed her.

"Mr. Giles, I'm running for my life and I need you to tell me where I can locate my brother."

Giles blinked.

"Well - er - Wesley left Sunnydale a year and a half ago. I believe he lives in Los Angeles now."

"Would you allow me to use your phone to book a seat on the bus?"

"Y-Yes, of course, go ahead."

******

15 miles outside of Galway, Ireland

"I am not lost!" Angel snapped.

"You are such a man! Why can't you admit that you have no idea where you're going?" said Darla, waving the map at him. "It says we go left at the fork!"

"Why can't you trust me for once? I did live in Ireland for 26 years."

"Yes, 247 years ago. Things change."

"This is Ireland, things never change."

"Angel, sweetheart, you're speeding."

Angel slowed the car down. It was a pretty red convertible, rented in a town about 100 miles away from their destination. That was the good thing about having a private plane, it could drop you anywhere you wanted it to.

"Happy now?"

"Now that we're not going to get a traffic ticket, yeah." She pointed excitedly. "Oooh - I see the sign! - No - wrong sign. You're gonna have to turn around and go back the other way."

"Fine." Angel grumbled. It was nightime, and they had the top down on the car. Darla leaned her head against the seat and looked up at the stars. The cool breeze gentley caressed the hair that hung loose around her shoulders.

"Dru would love this view." She murmured.

"Yeah." said Angel.

"Do you ever wish we could all be a family again? I mean, a not evil family?"

"It would be nice to have them sitting in the back seat." Angel agreed almost wistfully. "Arguing with William over what music to play on the stereo."

"Trying to ignore Dru's incessant rambling."

"Remember the time you threatened to 'turn this coach around and go back home if we all didn't stop yelling at each other'?"

"We were never good at long trips." said Darla.

******

London, England

"He's not here." Wesley said in dismay. "They must've gone to the country house for the week-end."

"You have a country house too?" Cordy tried to keep the awe out of her voice. They were standing in a spacious foyer, it was filled with antique furniture and old photographs of long dead family members.

"My father started using it more after Mum and Collin died. He grew to hate the city."

Cordelia guessed that there were other things Wesley's dad had started using more often - namely his fists and his paddle.

"My sister might be here. You'll like her." Wesley said absently.

"You have a sister?"

"Emma, age seveteen. Half sister. Dad remarried."

"Do they want her to be a Watcher too?"

"Yes, but I don't think it's something she wants. Not as if she has a choice, at least in Dad's eyes."

  
Go to Part 4 


	4. Chapter 4

Part 4  
  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  


Gunn had nearly the same reaction as Giles when he met Emma. She so clearly did not belong, looking so British Boarding School that she seemed straight out of a porn movie. He even bet that her underwear was white and cotton and extremly modest. And then he smacked himself mentally for thinking about her underwear when she was so clearly a damsel in distress. A pretty, raven haired, big blue eyed, long legged damsel in distress.

"What can Angel Investigations do to help you?"

"I need to see my brother, Wesley. Do you know when he'll be in, or perhaps where he might live?"

"Uh - The entire team's gone to England - I'm watchin' the place for them."

Her face crumpled.

"I just came from there!" She sniffled. "I need to see him!" tears slid down her sculpted cheeks. "I-I-I need his help! They're after me and I need Wesley!"

She reached into her bag, pulled out a kleenex and blew her nose daintily.

"So sorry for the outburst. You must think I'm terribly weak."

"I could call him?"

"Would you? Oh that would be ever so kind of you!"

******

London, England

Wesley swore. Loudly.

Cordelia turned from the window she was staring out of.

"So it's happened then?" Wesley said into the reciever. Pause. "Please keep an eye on her - she's very - Yes I know she is. She's underage, Charles. Don't let her out of your sight, unless you're going someplace where she shouldn't be - then don't take her with you. Don't let her drink, don't take her out to clubs and don't try anything with her."

"Why? Why? Because, as I mentioned before, she is underage. She's my sister, and she knows self defense."

"Two black belts and a brown."

"Yes, I'm sure that's why she's so toned. May I speak with Emma, please?"

"Em? What are you doing in Los Angeles?"

"No, I won't tell Dad where you are."

"No, he isn't in the room with me. He's not home."

"I'll be back in a week, sit tight and don't do anything stupid."

"Yes, Emma. I love you too."

Wesley hung up the phone.

"So you're not gonna tell your Dad where she is?"

No, I'm not. If he found out, he'd drag her back, and there'd be hell to pay for both of us."

******

Galway, Ireland, or somewhere abouts

"Honeymoon?" The tiny receptionist asked as Angel arranged for their rooms in the small hotel just outside the town.

"No, we're not married." said Darla. The woman frowned.

"Seperate beds then?"

"Yes, please." Angel said, Darla detected what she thought was a note of relief in his voice.

"Americans, eh? First trip to the Emerald Isle?"

"I'm American." said Darla. "He was actually born here. Right here in this very town."

"A search for your roots thing?"

"Sort of." She took the key and they went upstairs.

"Why'd you tell her you were American?" Angel hissed.

"Because it's much easier than explaining that while I lived and died in Virginia, and have an American accent, I am not in fact an American because when I was alive, that country did not exist."

"Oh."

"So, does Galway look any different two centauries later?"

"Very, very different." said Angel. "There are more - people for one thing. And a lot of the streets seem to have been renamed. And there are new buildings."

"We'll go on a walking tour tommorrow."

"I hear it's supposed to rain." Angel was starting to feel nervous about walking around the town of his birth, death and first bloody rampage.

"Good, then we can go in the daytime."

******

It did rain, and Darla bought a pale blue umbrella for herself, and a black one for Angel. They strolled down the street, feeling just like two normal, human people. They even got a few stares, rarely was such an attractive couple seen outside of films or television.

"Does this bother you?" Angel asked. "I mean - walking around like this, in the place where we caused so much pain?"

Darla smiled. So young, still so young.

"There's no where I haven't caused pain. If I went around avoiding the scenes of my crimes, I'd have to lock myself in the closet and be fed pancakes under the door."

"True."

He felt compelled to hold her hand for some strange reason. It still felt as soft and dainty as it always had.

"There's the tavern where I first saw you." She said. "Do you want to go inside?"

"They might hassel me about that tab I never paid off!" Angel joked. A slight chill as they passed another significant spot on their way to the pub. The alley where they'd first met. The place where he'd been turned, where his life had changed forever.

They stood and looked at it for minute, each lost in his or her own thoughts. As allies go, it was pretty crummy. Black, muddy puddles, water dripping off beams and roofs and window sills. Modern trash thrown on the ground where Darla's delicate shoes had once stood, while Liam died in her arms.

Darla put her arm around Angel's waist and leaned her head against his chest.

"I'm sorry." She said.

"Hindsight is 20/20." said Angel sadly.

"Well, well." A voice oozed like oil. "If it isn't Angelus and Darla. Back from your little trip abroad?"

Dark shadows loomed behind them, appearing almost from out of the woodwork and the tiny spaces between buildings.

"Hamilton." Said Darla.

The voice became a man in his thirties, with long, shaggy red hair and an old green fishmen's cap on his head. He was in game face.

"You two have been gone a long, long time. Things have changed around here - I'm in charge now."

"That's good for you." said Angel. "Way to go, Hammie."

"I won't have you screwing things up for me."

"We weren't planning on it." said Darla. "You leave us alone and we'll leave you alone."

"I can't do that, Darla." said Angel. "We have an obligation to these townspeople."

"Damn your obligations, Angel! I don't want a fight!" Darla protested.

"Trouble in paradise?" Hamilton leered. He leaned in and caressed Darla's blonde locks. "Wanna a trade up for a real man?"

Angel shoved the other vampire away from his Sire.

"Oooohh...So it's like that, huh?"

  
Go to Part 5 


	5. Chapter 5

Part 5  
  
  


"Do Not Touch Her." Angel snarled.

Hamilton laughed and shoved back.

"Then stop me."

Angel picked him up and threw him against the side of a building.

"Okay." He said.

"Angel! Look out!" Darla yelled as a vampire flung himself at her. She hit him with her umbrella, driving the wooden handle through his heart. The demons rushed them, there had to be about six in all.

"This just goes to show-" Punch, kick, stab. "That you can't go home again." panted Angel.

"No kidding." said Darla as she beat a vampire about the head with her umbrella.

"Probably wouldn't be a good idea to hang around anymore." said Angel. "I don't think we're welcome here."

Sirens blared in the distance.

"Cops!" Someone shouted.

The demons started running, Angel and Darla shook their human faces back into place as a policeman approached.

"What's going on here? " The officer demanded.

"We - we - Those guys tried to rob us!" Darla wept, it was an amazing performance. The cop didn't look like he quite believed her, but there was something about Darla that made you want to believe she was telling the truth, even when you were sure she wasn't. And she was a beautiful, blonde, american tourist out for a romantic stroll with her boyfriend. So it had to be just a trick of the eyes that he had seen her a moment ago, vigarously whacking someone with an umbrella.

"We're alright, Constable." said Angel. "We'll be going back to our hotel now."

******

A figure waited for them in their hotel room. A shortish, stout man in a leather jacket, who brandished a crossbow.

"I've finally found you - Angleus. " He said.

"Smith. " said Angel. "Darla, get the bags. I think I left the car unlocked."

"Who is this jerk?"

"He's a Special Ops Watcher, who is under the impression that I'm evil."

"Ooooh, So he's come here to kill you?"

"Yup."

"Well, he's pretty dumb then, isn't he?"

"I think you might be right, Honey."

"On three?" Darla asked. Smith looked confused, and lowered his crossbow briefly.

"On three. One. Two."

"Three." Angel and Darla both leaped for the window at the same time, and crashed through it. They sailed through the air and landed amongst piles of broken glass on the sidewalk. It was still pouring rain, so they had a chance of getting to the car without bursting into flames. Angel dove inside and slid his keys into the ignition. Hamilton's vamps were gathering at the end of the street - blocking the path of the convertible.

"I don't think they're going to move." Darla worried.

Angel smiled coldly.

"Well, then. We'll just have to run them down."

"Are you serious?" Darla asked, incredulous and pleasantly suprised.

"You bet."

"That's my boy!" She laughed as Angel slowly put his foot to the gas pedal. The expressions on the other vampires' faces said that they didn't believe he'd actually do it. Darla knew better, and so did Hamilton - who turned pale.

Angel accelerated. 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 85, 90. To their credit, the demons didn't run. Even as the small red car plowed into them and kept going, leaving a wake of bodies behind it. Darla climbed up on her seat to get a better look at the carnage.

"The more things change, the more they stay the same. " She remarked.

"How do you mean?"

"The last time we were here - we left a pile of bloody bodies in our wake - only they were human and we galloped away in a cart."

"I see your point."

******

Wesley turned down the long, tree lined driveway of his family's country home. Cordelia watched as the flowering trees zipped past the window of their rented car. She thought she saw a horse grazing in a field, on the other side of a fence. Horses. She used to have a horse - Keanu the palamino. She remembered what it was like to summer in Europe, in houses like this one. A small, grey haired man met the car as Wesley pulled it into the circular driveway.

"Good to see you home, Sir."

"Good to see you again, Rogers."

"I'll bring the car in, Sir."

"Thank you." Wesley removed his and Cordy's suitcases from the trunk. Or the "boot" Cordy thought proudly, pleased with her ever expanding British vocabulary. She followed Wesley inside the house, as another servant, this time a maid - took their bags upstairs.

"If you don't mind my asking, Sir -" Said Rogers, who had returned from parking the car. "Didn't your father ask that you not -"

"I have urgent matters to discuss with my father -" Gravel crunched in the driveway, a car had arrived. Wesley turned a little paler.

"Then you're just in time." said Rogers. He hurried to open the door. A tall, dark haired, solidly built man entered, followed by a willowy woman in a sharp traveling suit. She swept over to Wes and planted emotionless kisses on both cheeks.

"Dear."

"Lauren."

Wesley's dad walked past him. Dissapointment showed clearly on Wesley's face.

"I told you not to return home unless I gave permission." said Mr. Wyndham-Pryce.

"I have something I-I need to discuss with you."

"After dinner." Lauren said in a falsely cheerful voice. "And why haven't you introduced us to your lady friend?"

"I don't approve of you bringing guests home without informing us first." Wesley's father grumbled.

"Dad, Lauren - This is Cordelia Chase, we work together."

Lauren gave her a fake smile.

"She's lovely. And such an interesting ensemble - Wherever did you find it?"

******

"I was practicing spells in my room at school-When I first thought about it." Emma explained to Gunn.

"Practicing Spells." He repeated.

"Daddy wanted me to be ahead, when I entered the academy next year. Anyway, I started to think, Why am I sitting in my room learning how to levitate a pencil when I could be out playing field hockey or swimming or god forbid - shopping. And of course, I'm not allowed to tell anyone why I spend so much time in my room - or why the hell I'm on the fencing team."

"Fencing team."

"The Fencing Team. How uncool can you get?"

"I'd say that's pretty dorky." said a loud, strident voice. They both turned around. A shortish, thin girl with curly brown hair stood in the doorway of the lobby.

"Faith." Emma gave a ladylike snarl. Faith saunterd in, tossing her duffle bag onto one of the couches.

"Who's Faith?" Gunn asked, getting more and more confused every minute./P> 

"You hurt my brother." Emma stared at her with a mixture of anger and terror and awe.

"Who the hell are you?"

"Shouldn't you be in jail?" Emma countered. "I'm Wesley's sister, Emma."

"Oh. Gee. Um." Faith looked a tiny bit freaked out. "Out on good behavior."

"But who are you?" Gunn still wanted to know.

"Faith. The Slayer."

"What's a Slayer?"

******

Cordelia thought Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce was the phoniest woman she'd met outside of Hollywood. Dinner conversation was stilted-and evryone seemed relieved when the last plate was cleared from the table.

"I'll see you in my study now." Mr. Wyndham-Pryce said stiffly. Wesley followed him out of the room.

"You've dissapointed your family, broken your vows, and now you are disobeying direct orders?"

"I-"

His father closed the study door and moved to sit behind his desk.

"This is far from like you."

"I-I came b-because I have s-something to give you, Sir."

"Well. Where is it then?"

"Um - A-As you know, Colin was killed in Los Angeles - some very k-kind people, friends of mine - gathered up his ashes f-for us." He handed the small urn to his father.

"Thank you. " His father said quietly. Then he was back to business. "Now there is the matter of your sister to consider. Have you seen or spoken with her?"

"No, Sir." Wesley lied.

  
Go to Part 6 


	6. Chapter 6

Part 6  
  
  
Somewhere near the town of Oxford  
  


The phone rang in the library at Wesley's house. Lauren came out, holding the phone and looking confused. "It's a young woman, she'd like to speak with you."

"Darla?" Cordy asked into the reciever. She could hear the sound of wind rushing by, a faint static noise, as if the vampire were riding really fast in a car.

"We had a little problem, some vamps apparently thought we were coming back to reclaim territory, then this Watcher showed up - Smith I think his name was."

"Little fat guy - with a crossbow?"

"Yes."

"He thinks Angel is evil. We had to jump out the window to get away. Our road trip is not turning out the way we hoped. Angel and I thought we might come and visit you in Merry Olde England?"

"Please, please come. "She lowered her voice. "These are the least fun people I have ever met."

Lauren was staring at Cordelia suspiciously. Cordy turned her back and covered half her face with a hand.

"Just be careful of the whole *bloodsucker* thing."

Wesley and his father came back from their meeting, you could cut the tension with a knife.

"See you later." Cordy said to Darla.

"Bye bye."

"Wes - We need to talk." Said Cordelia.

(A few days later)

"I've never met a Watcher before." said Darla as Angel pulled into the Wyndham-Pryce drive. "I mean, who's not Wes - or that other guy - you know - the old one. Buffy's Watcher. I vaguely remember sitting on him once."

"You've sat on so many people." Angel joked. "No one expects you to remember them all."

"That's not funny." Darla snapped. Angel was instantly contrite.

"Hey, I didn't mean it."

"I know." Her Childe didn't know the truth, and if she had her way, he never would. Funny how she was more ashamed of her human life than of anything she had done during her 400 years of soulessness. What did Angel think her life had been like? Who did he think she had been? "So this is Wesley's family home, hmm ?"

"Little Toff." Angel grumbled.

A small, grey haired man came out of the house and offered to park the car for them. A maid answered the door and took their suitcases upstairs.

"You made it!!" Cordy sounded relieved to see them.

"Who are these people?" Wesley's dad demanded.

"Dad - These are my friends - coworkers -"

"William." Angel said quickly.

"And Mary." said Darla.

If Wesley's file on them was any indication, if his father knew their real names he was bound to put the names with the drawings and daguerotypes of them scattered throughout the Watcher archives. Mr. Wyndham-Pryce raised an eyebrow.

Durning dinner, Angel and Darla poked unenthusiatically at their food, trying not to seem impolite about the fact that they really couldn't taste it.

"Are you also a private detective?" Lauren asked Darla.

"I'm fairly new to the firm, but yes, I go out on cases." The meat had gravy on it - Darla hoped no one would notice that she seemed to concentrate on it.

"What part of America are you from?"

"Virginia. Spent a lot of time in Europe until my father moved us to Sunnydale. That's where I met Cordelia, and The Slayer." It wasn't a lie, exactly.

"I've heard some interesting things about the Slayer." Said Wesley's Dad.

"Buffy is -" Darla saw Angel giving her A Look and changed her mind. "Buffy."

"Buffy." Cordelia agreed.

"Wesley certainly bungled that assignment." Mr. Wyndam Pryce said. They all found somewhere else to look.

"Excuse me," said Wesley.

"Wesley dear," said Lauren, completely ignoring what he'd just said. "The Vicar called and asked if you'd like to help some of the other boys set up chairs for the church picinic on Saturday?"

Wesley stood up, throwing his fork down on the plate with a clatter.

"Don't leave the room while your mother is speaking to you." Mr. Wyndham-Pryce said a low, dangerous voice.

"She's not my mother!" Wesley snapped. He stormed out.

Cordelia found him leaning against the railing on the stairs.

"I don't know why I came here." he said.

"Because you're a good son, even if he's a terrible father."

"But he isn't! He fed me, clothed me, educated me, never lost my pram at Harrod's - I feel so guilty for letting him down."

"He also locked you in the closet, constantly insults your intellingence and raised you not to have a mind of your own!"

"He wanted to make me the best. My brother died because he wasn't good enough!"

"My father wanted me to be the best too - He broke the law to make me happy. Let me tell you - I feel kinda guilty about that. But that man in the dining room treats you like something he scraped off the bottom of his shoe, and you don't deserve it."

******

Darla and Angel walked along the garden path. It was late in the evening, and the two creatures of the night were restless. "I've never been on a vacation before." Angel confessed. "Since I got my soul back, anyway."

"We could shop for sounvenirs - If anything were open. Although everytime I come to England, I leave with a kid."

"Those British kids are so damn cute, one simply has to have them."

"When Wesley and I were -" Darla heard her Childe snort. "I kept thinking how much I'd love to turn him."

"Wes is wound so tight - his demon would be an unholy terror."

"Hello there." Said a male voice. It was Rogers, the butler. "Out for an evening stroll, are we?"

"You have such lovely grounds here. We were just admiring them." Said Darla.

"Please be careful, there may be Things That Go Bump lurking about."

"We'll be careful." Darla assured him. They said their cheerful goodnights and kept walking.

"When you and Wesley - er - was he - good ?" Angel asked his Sire.

"Very sweet, and fumbly in the beginning, but once he got going he was fine. Why do you ask?"

"Was he - uh - better than me?"

"No one's better than you." Darla assured him. "Except maybe for Spike."

"WHAT?"

"Relax, I'm just pulling your chain." She laughed.

Rogers hurried across the darkened grounds, back to His Lordship's study to inform him of the true nature of his weekend guests.

******

Wesley lay in his old bed trying to get some sleep. Familiar shapes loomed in the blackness, bringing back childhood nightmares. Knowing that demons and monsters really existed had never helped with the fears. Wesley resisted the temptation to hide underneath the covers.

Tick, tick, tick, tick. The numbers on his clock radio glowed red. 11:30 p.m. How many more hours before he had to get up and face his parents again?

No matter what Cordelia said, he knew that coming here had been a bad idea.

Wesley felt it in his bones.

And with Emma in Los Angeles, and two vampires stopping under his father's roof, if anything bad were to happen.

******

Richard Wyndham-Pryce paced the floor of his study.

Something about the boy's friends wasn't sitting right. There was something slightly *off* about them. He never paid much attention to his son's trivial conversations but he couldn't recall any mention of a William, or a Mary. And no record of them among Mr. Giles' Watcher diaries - surely they would have been listed among the aquaintences of Miss Summers? Mary, the small blonde lass, looked oddly familiar. Something about her that tugged at the corners of his memory.

He thumbed absently through a volume of the Diaries.

_Today, the Slayer encountered two vampires while attempting a rescue. The first, Luke, she described as a large man with sandy hair. The second, she describes as a small blonde female, whom Luke reffered to as *Darla*. The Slayer engaged them both in combat, winning the fight with Darla, although not succeeding in staking her. Her fight with Luke was somewhat less successful, however the Slayer and one victim escaped unharmed._

The Slayer has made aquaintence with a certain vampire named Angel. She describes him as tall and dark haired.

Also known as Angelus, The Scourge of Europe. Angel claims to have been cursed by gypsies and given a soul. I fear that the Slayer has begun to trust him too much.

The Slayer once again engaged Darla in combat. The vampire Darla had two pistols, which she fired repeatedly at the Slayer. The vampire Angel approached Darla from behind, driving the crossbow bolt through her back and dusting her.

He moved over to his box of newspaper clippings - picking up a certain article that he hadn't looked at in years.

_AUGUST 18, 1982._

The victim was seen, according to friends, leaving the disco with a small blonde woman in a red jacket.

He thought about the dinner, and the lack of food consumed by William and Mary. Their strange way of speaking, and the fact that they had arrived after sundown.

Perhaps his mind was jumping to conlusions. According to the Watcher diaries, Darla had been dusted in 1996. There was a ritual, but who would be desperate or fool enough to resurrect a Master Vampire?

A knock sounded at the door.

"Yes?"

"It's Rogers, Sir. I have some information which you may want to hear."

******

"Hey." Cordy murrmurred sleepily as Darla entered the guest bedroom they shared. "You were out all night."

"It's what vampires do. " Darla started to change into her pink silk pajamas.

"Wes' parents are so old fashioned. They've got us in a completely separate wing of the house away from the guys. I mean, really. It's not like Wes and I are sleeping together. Heck, I've never even seen him in his underwear."

"Not bad."

"Huh?"

"Wesley's not half bad in his underwear."

"When did you see Wesley in his underwear?" Cordelia demanded.

"When we had sex." Darla said absently, pulling her hair back into an elastic. After 400 years, she could do her hair and put on makeup without a mirror.

"You slept with Wesley?" Cordelia's eyes flashed.

Darla blinked at her.

"Is that a problem?"

"Damn skippy, that's a problem! How could you?"

Well, Cordelia. Just because I have a soul doesn't mean I'm some sort of saint."

"Maybe you haven't been human in a long time, so maybe you don't remember the rules - But girls don't do this to each other! You don't sleep with someone else's man!"

Darla feigned a look of surprise.

"Wes is your man? Wow, when did that happen? Because according to what I've obeserved, and I think I'm pretty damn observant - you've been stringing him along for a year and a half. You weren't giving him what he needed, so I did."

"Where I come from, we call people like you Cheap Sluts."

"That's what they call it where I come from too! In fact, I'm a licensed Cheap Slut. Want to see my paper work?" Darla sneered.

"You're supposed to be with Angel!" Cordelia practiacally shouted.

"Angel? ANGEL? Angel isn't interested in me! The thing that Wesley and I had in common was that we were both in love with people who only thought of us as friends!" The hurt in Darla's eyes was obvious. Cordelia actually sort of felt sorry for the vampire. So strong, and tough, and yet she couldn't make Angel love her again.

"I didn't know."

"Of course you wouldn't - Little Miss *I'm The Center Of The Universe.* You don't have four hundred and twenty seven years of crime and sin under your belt. You haven't done so many terrible things that your own friends don't trust you. The man who was your constant companion and consort for half that time never had to kill you. The only man I've ever allowed myself to love, I'll never be married to him, I'll never bear his children, and I'll always share him with the Slayer."

"So you'll settle for meaningless sex with his best friend?"

"Yes." said Darla simply. "For someone who's lived in LA for two years, you're incredibly naive."

"I am not naive. I have morals, that's different."

"Morals?" Darla scoffed. "I started turning tricks at 14. Morals are all well and good, but when one is starving.... Wesley and I were starving for comfort and affection. We knew that I wouldn't experiance *perfect happiness*, get pregnant or make him sick. It was comforting and loving and the closest thing I've felt to warmth in a long, long time."

Cordelia looked at the floor in shame. She'd truly had no idea. Darla turned away, shrugged her small shoulders and climbed underneath the antique quilt with her back to her friend. Quiet sounds of catching breath, little hiccups could be heard so faintly that Darla was clearly trying to hide the fact that she was crying. She went and sat down on the bed, putting a tentative hand on the vampire's back.

******

Wesley stood looking out his window at the line of cars pulling into the drive. At five o'clock in the morning. There were Watchers getting out and being ushered inside.

Wesley found his father in the downstairs sitting room.

"What's going on?"

"Watcher's meeting." His father rounded on him. "Please explain to me how you were stupid enough to invite vampires into my home?"

"There are no vampires here, Sir."

"Don't play innoccent with me, Boy. You brought Angelus and Darla into this house. The vampire that killed Colin and your mother. Consorting with vampires and lying to your own father!"

"It wasn't like that!"

"The plan is to surround the house, while one of us attempts to dispose of the vampires without waking them."

"You can't!"

"The Watchers will demand that you be punished for this infraction, however, I believe that if you were willing to assist us they might forget about your role in the deceit." He handed Wesley a stake.

Wesley stood looking down at it sadly, before climbing the stairs to Angel's room.

******

Angel woke up to find Wesley staring down at him and holding a stake.

He grabbed Wesley's wrist and snarled.

"N-No-Angel. I'm not here to hurt you!" Wesley hissed. Angel dropped his arm. "They've found you out. You and Darla must leave at once!"

A few moments later Wesley and Cordelia and the two vampires were sneaking down the back stairs.

"I must learn to travel lighter." Darla huffed as she struggled with her large suitcase.

"We have a brief window of opportunity, while Dad is briefing them on the situation. I'll go and get the car, you three lay low in the bushes near the front gate. Cordy and I will have to leave our rental here."

They waited, crouching behind the shrubbery, while more cars arrived. There were flashlights waving and people shouting at each other.

"They're not here!"

"Search for them!"

"Close the front gates!"

Wesley drove up in a shower of gravel. The three of them jumped inside and Darla pressed the button for the automatic top. The Watchers heard the sound of the motor and ran towards it.

"EEEAA! They're shooting at us!" Cordy shrieked. Angel pulled her head down onto the seat.

"Get us out, Wes." He said. The front gate was starting to close when Wesley sailed through it with just inches to spare. "Wooden bullets. Clever."

  
Go to Part 7 


	7. Chapter 7

Part 7  
  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  


"I can't feel my legs!" Emma moaned as she and Faith excited the club.

"From the booze or from the dancing?"

"I'm not exactly sure." Emma confessed, as she stumbled slightly and Faith caught her.

"Whoooaaa, Nellie. You've had way too much!"

It was amazing what beer and a night on the town had done for Wesley's uptight and sheltered little sister. Emma had shed her school uniform for a pair of rainbow colored leather pants, a silver top and strappy red sandals that they'd picked out at the mall. She'd danced her little ass off at Le Cirque De Lune and after much prodding from Faith, tried alcohol. Faith herself had knocked back a few, but not gotten carried away. Just enough to have fun, not enough to lose control.

She'd actually gotten to like the English girl, after having all day to talk and get to know her better. They were polar opposites in terms of temperament, life experience, and goals. But Emma had some hilarious stories about her older brother, and Faith served as an All American tour guide (as well as introducing her to other, more universal things such as fake ids).

"Itsh funny," said Faith. "All the other Washers I met are all show uptight."

"It's 'cause I haven't shtarted Academy yet. They inshert the shtick up your arse after you join."

" 'Splains it." Faith nodded sagely.

"Hello, ladies." A big man was blocking their path. "Miss Wyndham-Pryce, if you wouldn't mind coming with me, please."

Emma backed away, her big blue eyes frightened.

"Who the Hell are you?" Faith demanded belligerently. "Some kinda perv?" Planting herself protectively in front of the younger girl.

"I am a member of the Watcher's Council of Britain, Miss. And this young woman - OOOF!" He doubled over in pain as Faith socked him in the stomach.

"Don't you morons ever learn?" She asked in disgust.

Three more guys came out of the shadows; Faith downed one with a flying roundhouse kick to the chest. AS SHE flipped number two into a trash can, Emma got in a timid punch at number three. Faith finished him off by hurling him into the street. Then they both ran like heck.

"That was incredible!" Emma gasped as she ran.

"I know, an' I ain't even shober," Faith said proudly.

******

The next morning, Gunn heard the sound of furious pounding on the front door and went to open it. On the other side stood a short blond man and a short blonde woman and a girl who looked about 14.

"Where's Angel?" the blonde girl asked urgently.

"You lookin' for Angel Investigations?"

"No, we need Angel," the blonde man said.

"Spike here thinks Angel's in trouble. He wouldn't stop bugging me until I agreed to come with him."

"Oh, like you weren't freakin' out, too."

"Shut up."

"Make me."

"Yeah, you'd like that, wouldn't you?" Spike leaned in towards her with a flirtacious grin.

"YO!" Gunn barked to stop the bickering. "What was that about Angel being in trouble?"

"I got a special connection with me Grandsire," Spike boasted. "I can tell when there's something wrong."

"His ex girlfriend, Drusilla, called and told him," Buffy explained.

"I'm so proud of her - She figured out how to use the phone!"

"Charles?" Emma asked, padding down the stairs. "Do you have any aspirin? I've got the most frightful headache."

She stopped and flushed when she saw Spike.

"Oh, Hello." She ducked her head shyly.

"Hey, it's the little girl from the street!" said Spike. "I thought you were looking for Giles?"

"I-I was, but he suggested I come here instead." She smiled nervously at Buffy. "I'm Emma Wyndham-Pryce, Wesley's sister. And you must be Buffy Summers?"

Buffy bit her lip to keep from laughing at the mere idea of Wesley having siblings. Although, this girl was not what she would have pictured, had she thought about it at all. Supermodel thin, with legs up to her ears, long dark hair, and gigantic blue eyes. And she was wearing a nice set of cloud pajamas and fuzzy Lion King slippers. Not the picture of Watcherly stuffiness.

"I-I thought it was really cool the way you stood up to the council like that," the younger girl said in a soft, accented voice. "You've always been one of my heroes."

"Thanks!" Buffy felt genuinely flattered. She'd never had an honest-to-goodness fan before. And judging from the enraptured way Gunn was staring at Emma, the British girl had a fan of her own.

"DUDE! Gunn, you got any aspirin? I got a wicked headache!" Buffy winced at the loud Boston accent seconds before her former Slaying partner entered the room.

"B."

"Faith."

Faith jerked her head in the direction of Spike.

"Still hookin' up with vamps?"

"We are not hooked up!" Buffy said indignantly.

"Whatever you say," Faith smirked.

******

"She managed to elude you, yet again?" Richard Wyndham-Pryce demanded.

"She had a companion - a young girl like herself. We believe she may have been a Slayer. We have pictures, your Lordship."

"She's dressed like a whore!" Wyndham-Pryce spat. "I did my best to raise her to be a lady and a proper Watcher, and instead she's run away to Los Angeles and is running around with rogue slayers who dress like harlots!"

"I understand that you wish to have her home, and safe, but you won't find her unless she wants to be found."

"I've lost a child already, and a wife. My second child is disobedient and incompetent. I don't claim to understand what is going on with my Emma, but I fear what will happen if she does not return home."

*You don't like her to leave the house without an escort.* His employee refrained from mentioning.

"She is 17, Sir. How much longer could you have kept her hidden away?"

"You aren't suggesting that I give up searching for my only daughter, are you?" the Watcher asked icily. "She will be brought home--by any means necessary."

******

"So, he's not your boyfriend?" Emma asked Buffy as she stuffed her few belongings into her bag again.

"EWWW! No. NO WAY," Buffy laughed.

"Buffy thinks Spike is disgusting," said Dawn.

"Spike is a hot bag o' sex," said Faith. "Go out with him, Buff. I mean it."

"Nobody asked your opinion, Faith."

"Methinks she doth protest too much?" Emma giggled.

"She definitely doth." Dawn agreed, holding up Emma's school kilt. "You actually wear this?"

"I go to a public school." She seemed mildly embarrassed by this fact.

"In England, public schools are actually private schools," Dawn explained to Buffy, who looked confused.

"I knew that," Buffy snapped.

"Better bone up on this crap, if you're gonna date an English guy." Faith snickered.

"I am not now dating Spike, never have dated Spike, NOR will I ever date Spike!"

"You shorties ready to go?" Gunn asked, appearing in the doorway. Spike was right behind him, and he looked vaguely hurt at hearing Buffy's words.

******

An English Forest (located somewhere near The English Countryside)

Wesley looked over at Cordelia, perched on the boot of Angel's rented red convertible. The midday sun filtered through the green trees and highlighted her chestnut hair in a way those store-bought blonde streaks never did. Cordelia kicked her Nine West leather boots against the side of the car. They were sitting guard duty, while Angel and Darla napped away the sunlight in a small tent.

"I can't believe I let you guys drag me on this trip," she said out loud.

Taking Wesley's silence for agreement, she continued.

"Really. I hoped that, you know, it would be fun or something. I didn't know I'd end up playing Robin Hood. The real dorky one with Richard Green, not the cool, violent one with Kevin Costner. Not that I like violence, but at least that Maid Marion had some backbone."

"I don't believe anyone is having that much fun anymore," said Wesley finally.

"At least we're together." Cordelia seemed flustered for a second, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear and looking away, then reasserted her normal personality.

"There isn't anyone else I'd rather be on the run with," Wesley confessed. Wesley opened his mouth to add a sarcastic remark before Cordy managed to find one for him.

"Me neither," She said softly, and when he turned his head his lips collided with hers.

  
Go to Part 8 


	8. Chapter 8

A Place In The Sun - Part 8 Part 8  
  
  
COTSWOLDS  
  


Wesley was too stunned to believe what had just happened. And remembering the last time she'd kissed him, he pulled away.

"What?" Cordy demanded.

"Just...the last time....you -"

"Oh, that?" she scoffed. "I wasn't thinking straight. What with the...visions...and Doyle's death...and that freaky empath demon guy -"

"So you really -?"

"Yes, Wes." She traced his jawline with a delicate finger. "I really do like you. A lot."

"I like you too, Cordelia. I've known you were special since the day I met you."

"In fact, I think I might lo-love you," she stammered. Wesley knew how hard it was for her to admit something like that, after all the times she'd been hurt.

"I love you, Cordelia my dear," he told her as he bent his head to kiss her again.

******

"Okay, everybody. We have to stay together," said Buffy. They'd just gotten off the boat and were standing on a darkened pier, searching for a cab.

"Geez, B. We ain't in kindergarten."

"Ain't no cab gonna stop for us," Gunn surmised.

"This isn't LA," said Spike. "Taxis actually stop for black guys here."

The six of them piled into the cab appeared before Gunn could respond. An odd looking group, to be charitable.

"So, Spike, you never told us exactly what Drusilla told you over the phone," said Faith.

"She was sobbing - something about *burning up* - and then *Angel beast! Angel beast!* and then *Grandmum is a bad girl!* Then she went off about a *man who watches and a woman who sees things.* I learned a long time ago not to ignore her when she tells me the future. Make sense of it, I can't, but family's family and blood is blood."

"Anything else?" Buffy asked.

"No, after that she kinda lost her train of thought."

"So we came all the way over here on the babbling of some vampire who's completely insane and probably doesn't even know what day it is?" Dawn asked as the cab arrived at the train station.

"When Dru says something's gonna happen, something is gonna happen."

Emma needed to use the ladies' room; Faith volunteered to walk with her.

"I wonder if maybe I shouldn't just go home?" Emma said. "If I'm going to have to be escorted everywhere, I might as well do what Daddy wants."

"No, being your own, free person is way better than being someone's prisoner. No matter how safe you think you are with them."

"You want anything to eat?" Buffy asked Dawn.

"I could do with some curly fries," said Spike, "with lots of catsup."

"Nobody asked you, Spike. I'm really only concerned with my sister."

"I'm not hungry," said Dawn.

Emma screamed. The four of them heard it all the way across the train station and ran towards the sound. Faith was lying on the ground, clutching her head.

"What happened? Where is she?"

"They hit me with something. Like a baseball bat. I blacked out."

"Did you get a good look?" Buffy asked, helping her off the tiles.

"No. They jumped us when we coming out of the john. I didn't see them!" she cried in frustration.

"You did your best," said Spike.

******

KENSINGTON

Emma sat crosslegged on her bed, talking to her stuffed cow.

"Well, this is a fine mess I've gotten myself into, Mr. Devonshire."

The stuffed toy just stared at her with his baleful eyes. She played with his ears.

"I expect I won't be allowed out on my own ever again. Not even down to the end of the drive!"

Emma took his chin and pushed it into his face, then released it.

"Daddy is quite, quite angry with me, I'm sure. " She curled up on the mattress, the stuffed animal clutched in her arms, remembering that altogether too brief taste of freedom. Her new friends, Charles and Faith and Spike and Dawn and Buffy. Especially Charles. He was a nice guy, perhaps even boyfriend material. It would have been nice to have her first real boyfriend, and do all the things that boys and girls did together.

One of the servants came in, knocking softly and opening the door carefully.

"Dinner is on the table, if you'd like to come down, Miss Emma."

"I'm not hungry."

She was alone again, lying on her bed, staring up at the B.B. Mac poster on her wall.

"I am such a baby! There isn't any way Charles would ever, ever, in a million years be interested in me."

Emma closed her eyes and soon there were tears on Mr. Devonshire's white fur.

******

THE FOREST

A loud report sounded throughout the woods.

"Sounds like Darla's got our dinner," Cordy remarked. "I'm so hungry I'd actually eat it, whatever it turns out to be."

"She's gone out hunting?" Wesley looked up sharply from the carefully contained fire he was building. "You can't just go around firing guns into the woods. There are laws, Angel!"

"Tell that to the 400-year-old demon who hacked and hewed the life out of the American wilderness. You tell my sire she can't hunt and kill her own dinner."

"But there are hardly any wild animals around anymore!"

"Then it should be interesting to see what she came up with," Angel said mildly.

"Says the man who used to eat rats," Cordy muttered. "Why can't we find a town and eat at a restauraunt? I'd even settle for a convience store."

"We need to lay low until we decide what we're going to do next," Angel explained. "Do we try and get back to the airport where David Nabbit's plane is docked, or do we keep trying to have our vacation?"

"I'd say the vacation is over."

Wesley's bag was ringing. He reached in and retrieved the cell phone.

"Wesley Wyndham-Pryce speaking."

"Gunn? Where are you?"

"Buffy and Spike and Faith?"

"Drusilla told him?"

"Charles, I can't hear you!"

"THEY WHAT?"

"Emma's been kidnapped," Wesley said solemly as he put down the phone and imparted the whole story to Angel and Cordelia.

"Faith says she thinks the men who took her were Watchers. They're in London. I don't quite understand what's going on..."

"Then I think we need to go to London," said Angel. "In a few hours, after we've eaten. I'll drive while you two sleep."

******

ON THE ROAD SOMEWHERE BETWEEN LONDON AND THE COTSWOLDS

"They look so sweet..." Darla cooed as she peeked in the rearview mirror at their young human friends asleep in the back. "Just like children."

"Or Spike and Dru. I keep expecting Wes to wake up and start whining."

*The Sweetest Thing* by U2 drifted from the radio; Angel moved to change the station.

"I happen to like that song!" a sleepy Wesley complained.

"Well, I don't!"

"Angel, turn it back!"

"Hey - Who's driving? I am, so I decide what plays on the radio!"

"No more pancakes, Miranda." Cordelia murmured, and then shifted against Wesley into a deeper sleep.

"What were you saying about flashbacks?" Darla laughed.

"It's not funny!"

"Yes, it is," she snickered.

The song ended, and a news report replaced it.

"The effort to solve a 16-year-old murder case continues tonight. Called the 'Fang Gang,' a group of three serial killers stalked the London club scene during the early 1980s. The name derives from the fact that all victims appear to have been bitten several times. Two victims were members of a wealthy and prominent family. Two of the suspects have been sighted in separate places, one in London and one in the small country town of Stoneham. Here's CID officer Jonothan Baker, with important information."

"We receive many, many calls from citizens claiming to have seen various suspects in unsolved cases. Mostly these are made up stories, or mistakes. However, we encourage anyone who has information to come forward anyway, you never know what we might find."

"What can you tell us about the suspects we should be watching for?"

"Suspect number one is a male, blond, 5'9", blue eyes. Suspect number two is a female, 5'7", black hair, blue eyes. Suspect number three is female, 5'4", blonde hair, blue eyes. If you see any of them, please do not approach them. They are very dangerous."

"He did this," Darla said. "Wesley's father did this."

"He's the only one who could ever give a clear description of you guys."

"The worst part is that this isn't some unmotivated 'All Vampires Are Evil And Must Die' thing - he's actually got a right to be vengeful. I did kill his son and turn the boy into a demon, thereby enabling him to kill his own mother."

"I guess the concept of us having souls is a little hard for His Lordship to accept. There are some people who just can't forgive, they don't have it in them."

******

KENSINGTON

"It's difficult for me to express in words how dissapointed I am in you," Daddy said, pacing the room.

"Daddy, I'm sorry I ra-"

"Until now, I hadn't thought you were capable of such actions. You know how I feel about you going off by yourself, let alone dissapearing to California."

Emma looked at the floor, knowing it was pointless to try to explain herself.

"The school is going to put you on Academic Probation; you're fortunate they haven't expelled you. You'll have to make up all your missed schoolwork, as well as missed training sessions, starting today."

"Yes, Daddy."

"Best get started right away. Your mother wants me to remind you that your debut is in two days, don't forget. For now I want 200 reps on the freeweights, and practice the Leopard form and the Python form seven times each. I'll be down to check your kicks and your fencing in four hours - and they better be up to par."

******

LONDON

Buffy stood hunched over the payphone inside a booth.

"Mom? We're gonna be here awhile - some stuff came up."

"Yes, Dawn's fine. She's dealing pretty well."

"I know, but she needs to be with me; I'm the one who's supposed to be protecting her."

"Mom? Did I hear Giles in the background?" She asked with a wicked grin.

"None of my business, I know, I know. Did I get any mail?"

Buffy listened to her mother read a letter over the phone.

"Miss Buffy Summers and Miss Dawn Summers are hereby invited to attend the debut of Miss Emma Margaret Wyndham-Pryce on February 22, 2000."

  
Go to Part 9 


	9. Chapter 9

Part 9  
  
  
A LONDON DRESS SHOP  
  


"Lift zee arms." Mme Doucette commanded.

Emma raised her arms obediantly. Her mother stood in the corner, making dissaproving cluck-cluck sounds with her tongue.

"The bodice will need to be taken in. She's too small."

The 70-year-old seamstress held the tape measure around Emma's bosom. She frowned.

"She does not eat enough. No breasts! Men still like zee breasts-yes?"

*So now my chest isn't big enough?* Emma wondered. Never close to being man enough for her father, never close to bieng woman enough for her mother. Mummy came over and straightened her posture, her socialite fingernails digging into Emma's bare shoulders. Emma felt like screaming.

Knocking them both unconcious, ripping off the dress and running down the streets of London, yelling at the top of her lungs.

"Have you decided what boy you want as your date?" Mummy asked.

"I - haven't r-really thought about it."

"Robbie Pelham is a nice boy. His mother told me....." Her mother continued rambling on and on about Mrs. Pelham and her lovely home, and Mr. Pelham's quite profitable Frozen Food Company. Emma tuned her out, slipping off into daydreams about a 6'3 black boy from Califonia.

******

ONE NIGHT LATER

KENSINGTON

"Wow." Dawn breathed as they stepped out of the taxi onto the Wyndham-Pryce front walkway. "It's like something out of Peter Pan or Mary Poppins."

Spike stared at the doorway with an expression of apprehension on his face.

"It's like something out of my..." He started to say, then abruptly closed his mouth when Buffy looked at him questioningly. The vampire tugged at the collar of his tuxedo and grinned at her.

"Shall we?" He went to link arms with her. Buffy slapped him away. "I wasn't gonna try anything!"

He was her date. Spike was Buffy's date. She had actually come to him and asked him.

"Spike, I never thought I'd ever say this - but will you be my date for the debutante ball?"

"Why don't you go with Gunn?" He'd asked.

"Cause if I go with Gunn, you'll have to go with Dawn - and that is not going to happen. We need dates and you guys are the only boys we know in the entire country."

William the Bloody was not sure he could contain his joy for an entire evening. Since he was her date, she was gonna have to dance with him and everything. She was gonna have to talk to him - and touch him - and let him get her drinks.

In the upstairs hallway, Emma stepped back and saw herself in the mirror.

She looked so different - like a beautiful princess. And she felt like one for the first time in her life. Maybe there was something to all this traditional hokey pokey after all.

"My little girl is all grownup." said Daddy as he adjusted his cufflinks.

"You really like it?" She asked hopefully.

"You're quite lovely. Don't you see how important these traditions are? Do you understand now why I want you to have your place in society and all the duties that come with it?"

"Yes, Daddy. I understand now." She smiled dutifully. Daddy reached down and touched her hair briefly. A strange, sad smile flitted across his face.

"Best get down to your party. " He turned and walked back into his own room.

******

LONDON

A HOTEL ROOM

Faith sprawled on her stomach across the double bed, feet waving in the air. The Slayer surrounded herself with chocolate bars and cans of Coke, with the TV remote in reach.

Kelsie Grammer was fighting Rosanne on Celebrity Death Match tonight. Who needs fancy deb parties when you got entertainment like that?

It wasn't like she wanted to be invited anyway. Spend an entire evening in a stupid, uncomfortable dress, making boring conversation with stuck up rich people? Nooo thanks.

"BUFFY?" Angel called, pounding on the door.

Faith padded over in her stocking feet and opened it.

"Hey, Guys. Buffy and them ain't here."

"That's a relief." Darla muttered under her breath.

"You guys hungry? I got Snickas and Coke?" Faith offered.

"Where is everyone else?"

"At Em's coming out party."

"I wanted to be there." Wesley said quietly. "Ahh, well, I'm sure there will be pictures."

"So you weren't invited?" Cordy asked Faith, her tone slightly gloating.

Faith glared at her. Cordelia, even though everyone kept saying how she'd grown as a person, ect, ect, wasn't making this any easier.

"I didn't wanna spend my night with a buncha debs anyways."

******

"Who is that man?" Wyndham-Pryce demanded, gesturing down at the crowd below him as he stood on the stairs.

"The elder Miss Summers' escort, Sir."

"That man is William the Bloody."

"I was given to understand that Spike has been incapacitated, Sir. Which would make him quite harmless."

"I don't care if he's in a damn coma! I want him staked and I want him staked now!"

Back down on the dancefloor, Spike was getting up the nerve to ask Buffy to dance. He shifted uncomfortabley in his chair, turning towards her. Buffy was tapping her foot to the impossibley cheery *music* the band was playing.

"Buffy - do you - would you like to -?"

"What, Spike?" She snapped.

"You wannadanceorsomething?" He blurted out.

"What the hell." Buffy sighed. They walked to the dance floor, and after a brief wordless struggle over who would lead, (Buffy won) fell into a rhythm.

Emma stood by the open french doors in the back parlor, looking out into the dark garden. She was holding a framed picture in her hands, looking down at it whistfully. The picture was of a young woman, long dark hair, flowing freely. Dark, sunbronzed skin, almond shaped brown eyes and the teletale indentation on her forhead. The folds of her white sari accentuated her slender frame. Gold bangles hung from her arms and a much younger, happier Daddy had his arm around her waist.

"What you doin' out here by yo self?" Gunn asked.

"Just getting some air. What are you doing back here?"

"Lookin' for the food." He answered truthfully. "Who's that?"

She gestured with the picture in hand.

"Wesley's mum. I never got a chance to meet her. I guess - actually - if she hadn't died, my parents would never have met and I would never have been born."

"Not really in a *party* mood, huh?"

"No, not really. It isn't exactly my party is it? It's theirs. Mummy and Daddy's."

"Dress up their doll and parade her around for all the neighbors?"

"Yes."

"You do look nice."

She blushed.

"Thank you. Mummy is quite dissapointed that they had to take in the bodice of this very expensive Vera Wang dress. Apparently I've failed her in the bosoms department."

"I like your - Even though I'm used ta girls with more meat on 'em - for a skinny, white chick - you" Gunn was having trouble getting it out. It didn't help that his eyes were drawn to her chest as if they had a mind of their own. He forced his eyes down to his feet, after an awkward silence, Emma took a deep breath and went for it.

"Do - Do you want to go upstairs?"

******

"Spike went as Buffy's date?" Angel asked skeptically.

"And don't think he wasn't thrilled." said Faith. A look of embarrasment crossed her face when she realized what she'd let slip.

"Spike - likes - Buffy?" Darla bit her lip to keep the laughter from escaping. "So, where is this party bieng held?"

"At our house in Kensington." Said Wesley. "My father is a parsimnonus man. And the smaller space enables them to only invite the Best People."

"Like the Slayer, and her little sister - Dawn *The Key To The Entire Universe* Summers." Said Cordelia.

"I imagine my father sees that as quite a coup." Wesley agreed. "It means nothing to Lauren, the Summers girls have no social standing, but all the other Watchers will be positively green with envy."

"There are going to be other Watchers there?" Darla asked. "Spike will be walking into a house full of professional vampire killers?"

"Not a housefull, however there will be many in attendance."

"After that news bulletin about his bieng wanted for murder? What if somebody recognizes him?"

"I didn't know you cared so much about Spike?" Cordy commented.

"Family is family and blood is blood."Darla answered.

"We gotta get him outta there." Faith jumped up off her bed. "Spike can't go to jail."

"Believe me." said Wesley. "If they catch him, jail won't be where he ends up."

******

"How do you feel?" Gunn whispered.

"Weird."Emma murrmured. "Nice, but weird."

"It is weird."He agreed. They were lying snuggled together on Emma's pink bed, Paddington Bear and Winnie the Pooh were watching from their shelf. Far more embarrassing was Mr. Devonshire, staring at them with his dissaproving bovine eyes.

"I ain't never been in a bedroom this nice before. Guess you really are a lady."

"It's not all it's cracked up to be. For instance, Daddy would go absoulutly - what's that American slang term? - Postal. Daddy would *Go Postal* if he found out that I'd even kissed a boy, never mind - what we -."

"Your Dad would have to get in line behind Wesley."

"My brother is a bit overprotective. We're all we've got."

"Had a little sis too. Wouldn't blame Wes at all if he wanted to beat me down. I'd at least hafta let'm try."

Emma went over to her window and opened it, looking down on the neighborhood. Gunn came and stood behind her, encircling her waist with his arms. He could feel her lack of underwear through the dress, her stereotypical white cotton panties were lying on the pink plush carpet a few feet away.

"That's Peter Pan's house, over there. I mean, the house where the book was written."

"It's a book too?"

"Yes." Emma smiled. "The children who lived in the house next door, would make up stories about Never Never Land and the Evil Captain Hook."

"Wow. I did not know that."

"I'm sorry-I-I've never had sex before, I have no idea what you're supposed to talk about afterward."

"This is fine. I'm always learnin' new stuff around you Wyndham-Pryces."

"I used to wish that Peter Pan would come and whisk me away to Never Never Land."

******

"Why are those guys staring at us?" Buffy wondered out loud as she bopped across the dance floor with Spike.

"Must be 'cause we make such a damn gorgeous couple." Spike had his back to the Watchers, who stood above them on the mezzanine.

"They look suspicious. Like they think we stole towls from the bathroom or something."

"Bloody Hell! They saw me?" Spike grinned.

"We are guests in their home!" Buffy lectured. "If we get thrown out because of something you did...."

"Oi was only funnin yah!"

"Why don't you dance with my sister for a while." Spike watched Buffy stomp off and sighed.

God, she was beautiful!

On the mezzanine, the two Watchers observed Spike dancing with Dawn in that careful I'm-dancing-with-my friend's-little-sister-way.

"He's got the Key, Sir. What shall we do?"

"Nothing is to happen to Miss Summers. That is a direct order from Travers himself." Richard Wyndham-Pryce said.

The Special Ops agent known as Smith cocked his crossbow in preparation.

"Think we can hit'm without damage to the Key?"

"I assume that you can. I doubt that your hand will slip, am I correct?"

Smith raised the bow and fired.

Spike heard a whistling through the air and looked up.

Suddenly Spike and Dawn were hit with 110 pounds of Buffy and knocked to the floor. The guests started screaming. Smith missed his target and the crossbow bolt lodged itself firmly in Buffy's right side.

"Buffy!" Dawn shrieked, cradling her sister in her arms. Buffy reached down weakly and yanked the bolt from her body. Blood seeped through the fabric of her white dress.

"Is there a doctor in the house?" Someone yelled.

"No time for that, we gotta go, NOW!" Spike gathered Buffy in his arms and made his way to the door.

"Stop that man - he's a murderer!" Smith shouted, running down the stairs. Emma and Gunn pushed through the crowd on the stairs. Emma made a move to run after her friends, Lauren restrained her with a firm grip on her upper arm. Emma stared at her father with hatred in her eyes.

"They were my friends." She said in a shaky voice.

******

"Where'd you learn to drive?" Cordy cried as she held onto the shoulder strap for dear life.

"Will you just shut up and let me concentrate?" Faith snapped.

"In all fairness, Faith-" Wesley piped up timidly. "That old woman was in the cross walk already."

He would rather have driven, or even had Cordelia drive, but no one dared argue with Faith when she was in Slayer mode.

Faith ran a red light. Wesley closed his eyes and mururmurred a half forgotten prayer.

Faith peeled around a corner, as police sirens grew louder.

"Which number are you?" She hollared over the noise.

"Number 12!" Wesley shouted back.

Faith skidded to a stop outside Wesley's house. Spike was hurrying down the front steps with Buffy in his arms and Dawn and Gunn close behind.

"Ohmigod, B!" Faith gasped.

  
Go to Part 10a 


	10. Chapter 10

Part 10a  
"Hanging By A Moment" is by Lifehouse  
"The Rose" is by Bette Midler  
  
  


Dawn was ripping off pieces of her skirt to help staunch Buffy's bleeding. The police sirens grew closer, so Faith stomped the gas pedal down to the floor. Cordy leaned over the side of the seat and gave directions to Spike and Dawn.

"Hush, hush." Spike whispered, stroking Buffy's hair as she whimpered in pain. "Can't you drive a little faster?" He barked at Faith.

"Don't you dare yell at me, you bleach-blonde freak!"

"Guys, please!" Wesley snapped. "Faith, take a right here at the intersection."

******

Emma stared at her Daddy, her anger rising.

How could he have done that?

"It wasn't supposed to happen that way. Miss Summers got in the way." Daddy said calmly. Emma searched his face for any semblance of feeling at all. Nothing. He was rationalizing the entire incident, making it so it would never be his fault. Emma had learned at the feet of the master how to keep her emotions in check.

"I'm going upstairs." She said quietly, not doubting that the party would continue with or without her.

In her room, Emma took off her white heels and threw them against the wall. Feeling horribly, sickeningly guilty after that display of anger, she went to take a shower.

"She'll get over it." Lauren assurred her husband.

"She must learn that vampires are creatures incapable of bieng anyone's *friend.* It doesn't matter what technology the American goverment placed in his brain, Spike is a vampire and will kill again."

"Dearest,"she said delicately, "Quentin has told me that he believes this has become a personal vendetta, and that he is concerned for your mental health."

"Quentin Travers may lecture me about mental health and personal vendettas when HIS wife and child are murdered by vampires, and the killers are allowed to roam free."

Emma placed one foot carefully on the next rung of the trellis. It creaked even under her slight weight. She had 60 seconds to reach the ground before the burglar alarm on her bedroom window went off.

It was amazing what a mind full of math and science could come up with in an emergency.

"They aren't going to be happy about the Slayer," Lauren reminded Richard.

"It couldn't be helped. She got in our way! Surely she did not believe that we would harm her sister?"

An earpiercing wailing began upstairs.

Emma moved to put her foot on the ground and felt a pair of strong male hands around her waist.

"It's me!" Gunn hissed.

"Charles," Emma breathed. "You came back?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

******

Spike sat with his head in his hands in the hospital waiting room.

"Is she okay?" Angel gasped as he ran in, followed closely by Darla.

Spike didn't say anything.

Wesley approached them and laid a hand on Angel's arm.

"She's lost a lot of blood, but she's going to live."

Faith was leaning against the wall, arms folded, eyes squeezed tightly shut. Cordelia was pacing at the other end of the hall. Dawn was sleeping curled up in a plastic chair.

"This is all your fault you know," Spike spoke up.

"What are you talking about, Spike?" Angel asked angrily.

Spike jumped up.

"She only came here 'cause YOUR demented creation insisted that you were in trouble!"

"Don't blame this on me!" Angel snarled. Darla touched his arm, but Angel shook her off. "What are you talking about?"

"She only came here because of you. You're the only thing that could get her to leave Sunnydale at a time like this. And now she's lying in there, and she might die, and it's all your fault!"

"Since when do you want Buffy to live? What, are you in love with her or something?" Angel asked incredoulously.

If Spike could have had color in his face, his face would have flushed bright red.

"Am not!"

"You are!" Angel laughed cruelly. "You love Buffy!"

"Take that back!" Spike vamped out. Angel vamped out, as well.

"It's true, isn't it?"

Spike launched himself at Angel, who easily shoved him away. Darla ran to hold her grandson back before he did something he might regret. Spike shifted back to his human features, breathing hard.

"Why don't you do what you do best, Angelus, and leave?" he said with a choked sob. Spike turned, hurled a chair against the wall, stormed off down the corridor.

******

Cordy, Dawn, and Faith sat together in the hospital cafeteria. Dawn was eating butterscotch pudding from a tiny plastic cup. Faith had a sandwhich, and Cordy nursed a Diet Pepsi.

"Notice how, once again, Buffy has managed to make it all about HER?" Cordy grumbled.

"How does she do that?" Faith wondered. "And how do we bottle it?"

"Buffy's not always selfish," Dawn spoke up. "She wasn't so bad when Mom was sick."

"I feel...wrong...sittin' here trashin' her when she's in the hospital," said Faith. "Think it's a sign that I'm becoming a nice person?"

"That'll never happen!" Cordelia snorted. Wesley came in and sat down with them.

"How are things going up there?"

"Spike and Angel got into an argument. Darla's probably going to get caught in the middle. I decided that standing outside Buffy's room was not the safest place for me to be."

"That's pretty much why we're down here," said Dawn. "Angry vamps are not on my list of favorite people to be around."

"We lead different lives from other people, don't we?"Wesley mused. Cordy reached over and touseled his hair.

"I'm not going to repeat my opinions about your father, Wes. But I think maybe he should check into getting some therapy for this little vendetta of his."

"He's become what he beheld."

"Do you guys think they're done screaming at each other by now?" Dawn asked. "I wanna go back up and check on Buffy."

"We'll come with," said Cordy. They stood up and walked back out through the lobby, toward the elevator.

"Excuse me, Miss." A young girl was speaking to the night nurse on duty at the desk. "Which room is Buffy Summers in?"

"Emma?" Wesley questioned. His sister turned around. She'd changed out of her ball gown and into a pair of faded blue jeans and a purple hooded sweatshirt.

"Wes?" She ran up to him, but they hesitated a moment before embracing.

"I was so scared. They grabbed me, and made me come home," she babbled. "Daddy wouldn't let me leave the house, and then we had my party, and it was no fun at all, and then he shot Buffy!"

"Shhh," Wesley mumbled into her hair. "I'm here now. I'm here now." Then he pulled back and looked at her sternly.

"You ran away again. Please tell me you didn't run away again."

Emma ducked her head sheepishly.

"I climbed down the trellis."

"EMMA!" Wesley groaned. "This is not the way to handle things!"

******

Four hours later, Buffy awoke in her hospital bed to find Quentin Travers sitting next to her.

"Get out," she whispered hoarsley.

"I want you to know, Miss Summers, that the Council was not involved in Lord Wyndham-Pryce's actions tonight. None of us wish to see you dead, not even Lord Wyndam-Pryce. It was all a terrible accident, no one intended for you to get hurt."

"Sure."

"Believe me, we'd all much rather have you alive. The idea of Miss Hennessy as our only active Slayer does not appeal to the Council."

"Miss who?" Buffy asked drowsily.

"Faith."

"Oh."

"I have discussed the situation with Lord Wyndham-Pryce. I have told him that he is to be more careful in the future, and impressed upon him the importance of not endangering the Key. However, I have also told him that while I will not actively seek to elimnate William the Bloody and Darla, I will not stand in the way of him doing so himself."

******

"Guys, we've got a big problem." said Cordy as they all sat at a table in a pub down the street from the hospital. "We're out of money. Well, me and Wes and Darla and Angel are. What about you guys, Gunn?"

Gunn pulled out his wallet and rifled through it.

"We got just enough to pay for these drinks, and one more night in the hotel. Then we're broke."

"I could sneak back inside the house and steal from Dad?" Emma suggested. Wesley turned a shocked face towards her.

"No you will not!"

"And we're going to need a bigger car." said Darla. "When Angel and I rented that little convertible we thought at the most, there'd be four people riding in it. Now it looks like we're up to 10."

"We were gonna take the train." said Faith, "But we'll still need money."

"We could call the jet, and have them meet us at a secluded location in the country,"Wesley thought out loud. "When will Buffy be well enough to travel?"

"Tommorrow." Spike announced as he entered the pub and flopped into a chair. "Quentin Travers paid her a visit today. He's given His Lordship carte blanche to go after me. Nibblin, you want something to drink?"

"Can I get a beer?"

Spike paused, clearly conflicted. Clearly trying to remember whether it was okay to give children alcohol or not.

"No." He said decisively.

I'll have an orange juice." Dawn muttered.

Spike gestured at Gunn.

"Gimme some cash."

"Don't got enough."

"What the hell!"

"We nevah expected to be here this long." Faith explained. "We're all out of money."

"Stuck in a foreign country with no money and we're hiding from an elite group of international demon hunters. FUN!" said Cordy, taking a big swig of her beer.

"I think we can all agree that stealing is out of the question." Angel decided.

Spike raised his hand.

"I don't agree with that!"

"I didn't ask you."

"Here he goes again," Spike muttered. "King of the mountain, that's our Angel!"

The bartender was starting to look at them suspiciously, and who wouldn't have, considering the subject of their conversation. They wisely settled up the bill and left the pub. As they strolled down the street, Darla had lagged behind to read a yellow flier taped to the window of a shoe shop.

"Spike, c'mere!"

He jogged over.

"Look, This club, The Junkyard Dog, has bands every night."

"So?"

Darla just looked at him. Spike started to back away.

"Uh uh. No way. No WAY."

"It's a paying gig - We need the money."

"No." He said a little more plaintively.

"It's settled then. I'll call the manager and arrange an audition."

******

The club was small, but homey. Darla and Spike were set up on a small stage at the back. The manager had certainly been impressed with their talents, and thought they had a *great look*. A big sign hung over the stage, advertising *The Two Bleached Blondes*. At this moment, they were arguing, or it looked like they were anyway. Spike was waving his arms animatedly, Darla stood with both hands on her hips, looking impatient.

It sounded, though faint and muffled by the noisy crowd, as if he were saying *But I hate Bette Middler!*

Darla's lips seemed to be telling him to perform a phyisically impossible action with himself.

Darla turned to the michrophone, a big, cheerful smile on her face.

"Hey, Everyone!" She chirped. Spike looked up from tuning his borrowed guitar and glared at the audiance. "How are y'all? Looks like Spike wants to get this over with, so let's get going!"

_"Desperate for changing  
Starving for truth  
Closer where I started  
Chasing after you  
  
I'm falling even more in love with you  
letting go of all I've held onto  
I'm standing here until you make me move  
I'm hanging by a moment here with you"_  
  


"I didn't know he could play." Buffy whispered to Cordelia.

"He's had 126 years to learn." Cordy whispered back.

_"Forgetting all I'm lacking  
completely and complete  
I'll take your invitation  
you take all of me  
  
I'm falling even more in love with you  
letting go of all I've held onto  
I'm standing here until you make me move  
I'm hanging by a moment here with you  
  
I'm living for the only thing I know  
I'm running and not quite sure where to go  
I don't know what I'm diving into  
just hanging by a moment here with you"_  
  


They played a few contemporary hits, some classic rock tunes, and as the evening wore down, some folk songs and ballads. At the end of the show, Darla held a short, whispered conversation with Spike. Everyone was suprised to see him go and sit down at the piano that was situated at the back of the stage. The lights lowered just a bit, as Darla took center stage with the microphone. The spotlight shone down on her bowed head. The tinkley notes of a familiar song began.

Darla took a deep, uneeded breath and opened her eyes. Her clear, pure voice floated out over the hushed crowd.

_"Some say love, it is a river,  
That drowns the tender reed.  
  
Some say love, it is a razor  
That leaves your soul to bleed.  
  
Some say love, it is a hunger,  
an endless aching need."  
  
"I say love, it is a flower,  
and you, its only seed."_  
  


"He plays the piano." Buffy murrmered to herself, staring at the stage in a sort of daze. "I didn't know Spike played the piano."

_"It's the one who won't be taken,  
Who cannot seem to give.  
  
And the soul, afraid of dying,  
That never learns to live."_  
  


Cordelia leaned her head against Wesley's chest, he reached down and stroked her hair. Faith shivered and reached for her denim jacket. A cold draft sent chills down her spine.

_"When the night has been too lonely,  
and the road, has been too long.  
  
And you think that love is only,  
for the lucky and the strong.  
  
Just remember, in the winter,  
far beneath the bitter snow...  
  
Lies the seed, that with the sun's love,  
in the spring, becomes the rose."_  


******

"That man is following us." Said Angel as the group strolled down the street after the gig.

"Yeah, we bein' followed." Gunn agreed. A man was walking slowly, about 50 feet behind them, talking intensly on a cell phone. Sometimes he could be seen, and sometimes he couldn't but he had been behind them for about four blocks and wasn't walking with the purposful steps of a man who just happened to be going in the same direction.

"We can take one guy." Faith laughed. "If anyone could, it's us!"

"I think there's more than one person tailing us." said Darla. "These guys never work alone. They've probably got a car waiting around the corner, with another guy in communication over the phone."

"Or someone will block us off when we get to the end of this street." Angel added.

"We've done a lot of stalking in our time." Darla said wryly.

"Remember, If they come after us, to keep Spike and Buffy protected, Buffy's weakened and Spike can't hurt humans." Angel instructed.

"Hey - who died and made you boss?" Buffy complained. "I'm not so weak that I can't defend myself!"

"I wasn't trying to boss any of you around!" Angel protested. "Except for maybe my Grandchilde and the three of you who WORK for me. I would never presume to give YOU orders!"

"Oh, Angel, you're stealing Buffy's thunder? Poor girl must be so upset that she can't be in charge." Darla drawled.

"It's not MY fault we're on the run from angry Watchers." Buffy reminded everyone. "I hate to point fingers but a certain vampire kinda caused that little problem!"

Darla threw up a *talk to the hand* and kept walking.

"Let it go, B." said Faith. "It's seriously not worth it."

"When did you get so mature?" Buffy smiled sadly.

"Prison, baby. Prison."

"You look cold." Wesley said to Cordelia. He took off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders. "Better?"

"Much better." Cordy put her hand in his. It still felt strange to be doing *couple* things with the man who was her best friend. "Thank you." She whispered.

"I'll do anything for you, you know that."

"You know you're not getting it back, right?"

"I know." Wesley sighed.

******

"I'm bored." said Dawn, who sat crosslegged on Faith's bed, a bottle of purple nail polish in her hand.

"I hate this. I totally hate this." Em agreed. "We're not babies, they didn't need to leave us here while they went out to the club."

"Keep the doors locked and DON'T LET ANYONE IN." Dawn did an excellent imitation of her sister. "I'm not a moron and I'm not five."

A knock sounded at the door. Emma got up and went over, standing by the lock.

"Miss Wyndham-Pryce? Miss Summers?"

Emma put a finger to her lips, meaning *don't speak*.

"On behalf of the Watcher's Council, I'm asking you to please open the door."

Emma tried to slow the pounding of her heart, sure that he could hear it on other side of the door.

"It would not be wise to refuse us, Girls. If you don't open this door, I shall have to take drastic measures."

The hotel was an old one, so the doors didn't have key card setups, only regular locks. A clicking sound, as if someone were fiddling with the lock, then a final click as the knob turned and the door swung open.

******

Angel and Darla were the first ones to get off the elevator at the hotel. The door to the girls' room was wide open.

"Oh no..." Darla breathed. Buffy pushed past them both.

"NO!" She cried. Dawn and Emma were no where to be seen, and there was an unconcious man on the floor.

"Looks like someone hit'm with a lamp." said Faith.

"No, they just knocked it over, that looks more like a *phone* shaped dent in his head." said Darla.

  
Go to Part 10b 


	11. Chapter 10 B

Part 10b  
  
  


Dawn leaned up against the wall, panting.

"Think we lost them?" She asked.

"NO!" Emma squeaked as a burly man in black leather thundered toward them. The girls started to run again. Dawn was starting to sound winded, and Emma began wondering why she herself didn't seem to feel tired.

*Must be adrenaline and a good physical fitness program.*

A taxi skidded to a stop in front of the two young girls who suddenly dashed out into the middle of downtown London traffic. The driver slammed on the horn.

"Sorry! " Emma called to him. "Excuse me, pardon me, sorry!" as she pushed her way through the crowds of stunned commuters and shoppers.

"Em? I can't -" Dawn cried as her breath came in asthmatic gasps. Emma knew they had to stop running. She stopped, and turned around to face the man who loomed over them.

"You're not a very nice little girl, to do this to your father. He only wants what's best for you."

"I'm not going back and you can't make me!" Emma yelled.

He reached out to grab her and Emma reacted on what she later decided must have been instinct. She blocked his arm, and brought up her knee to slam it into his groin. Then she spun around on one foot and gave him the same roundhouse kick she'd seen Faith use that night outside the club.

He sank to the pavement, gasping in pain.

"What did you do?" Dawn gaped.

"I-I don't know-som-something just took-took over!"

"I think you broke some stuff."

"Are you alright?" Em asked the man with concern.

"No!" He growled.

"We'll call you an ambulance." She decided as she fished around in her pockets for some change. "I didn't mean to hurt you, I just don't want to go back."

"Wow." said Dawn as they walked away after their pursuor was loaded into an ambulance. "That was like-slayer stuff!"

"I can't do that-I'm not a slayer, I'm just a normal girl." Emma insisted. "What happened back there was really scary."

******

"And you're saying that there were two girls alone in the room while you were gone?" The police officer asked. He was industriously scribbling on a yellow legal pad.

"Yes, " said Wesley. "Our little sisters (gesturing at himself and Buffy). One is seventeen and the other is 14. They aren't the types to sneak out."

"Can you give us some kind of description?"

"The seventeen year old is about 100 pounds, very dark hair and blue eyes, olive skin tone. The fourteen year old is also thin, with extremely long light brown hair, blue eyes and freckles."

"She might be wearing a red cardigan and tan cargo pants." Buffy interjected worriedly. "Mom's gonna flip!" She muttered to herself.

The officer bent down to examine the door.

"It looks as though someone picked the lock, presumably our friend here on the floor. " He looked to his partner for confirmation.

"And the girls did a wonderful job of defending themselves - unless," and they all moved aside to make way for the paramedic, "he had an accomplice who may have taken them."

"Em and Dawn would have called the police, I KNOW they would have." Buffy fretted.

Gunn was slowly and silently punching the fist of his right hand into the open palm of his left.

"Well, I say we go find the slimebag who we know did this and put iz head through the wall!" Faith made a few punching motions in the air.

"I thought you were the new and improved Mature Faith." Cordy smirked.

"Not that mature." Faith said darkly.

"You believe you know who did this?" The officer asked.

"My father is..." Wesley found the words difficult to say after all these years.

"His father is kinda abusive and controlling." Cordy explained. "Em keeps running away from home and her daddy keeps dragging her back."

"He has - a lot of power and influence, and he uses it to keep track of his children."

"Gives new meaning to the phrase *Oxford Don*" Angel mumbled.

"We'll have a bulletin put out, and we'll contact you if anything should come up." said the officer.

******

A Few Hours Later

Richard Wyndham-Pryce handed the phone back to the maid.

"One of our men, Hobbs, was brought to hospital last night." He told his wife, who was deep into reading In Style magazine as she sunned herself in front of the window.

"Oh dear, is he all right?" Lauren asked as she politely tried to place the name. "Was he important?"

"Not in the grand scheme of things, no." Richard sighed. "He was admitted with four broken ribs and a-er-groin injury. "

"Our daughter isn't capable of breaking a man's ribs and-ah-incapacitating him."

Richard was quiet. His wife looked up from her magazine and stared at him.

"Actually - she is." He admitted, looking slightly sheepish and contrite which was an expression seldom seen on his face.

"She's my daughter too, what have you not told me?"

"There was a reason why Emma's training program was as intense as I made it, why I drive her as hard as I do. She has to be ready if she is ever called."

"Called?" Lauren struggled to understand.

"The Watcher's Council is a tradition in my family - Watchers are destined. I had expected my children to become Watchers. Susan and I had only boys, and we believed that we would not have more children, therefore I thought this situation could never arise."

Light was beginning to dawn in Lauren's mind.

"We met, darling, and when Emma was born I realized what she was - what she was destined to be. "Seeing the angry look on his wife's face, he continued quickly. "It's all very random, there is no choice in the matter, for her or for us."

******

"Are you SURE you're not a slayer?" Dawn pestered as she and Emma walked down the street.

"I'm sure." Emma said. "A slayer has the strength of ten men, and I don't even have the strength of one very strong girl."

"You could if you tried. I bet you could. I bet you five - uh - pounds or something - that you can't do something slayery. Go on, try!"

"You don't have five pounds." Emma reminded her.

"So, do it just to see if you can." The younger girl challenged.

"I can't." said Emma.

"Why not?"

Two Watchers were coming towards them, determined looks on their faces.

"Because we have to start running again."

"I think you're a slayer." said Dawn as they ran. "I think you only THINK you're not strong, and I think your dad wants you to believe that so he can control you."

"Dawn?"

"Yeah?"

"Can we not talk about this right now?"

******

"Darla?" Angel asked quietly. "Can you stay with Buffy and Spike while they look for Dawn? Wes and Cordy and Faith are going to take the train to the country house in case they make it there - Gunn and I are going to see if we can get Nabbit's plane back."

"Fine." Darla grumbled. "But Muffy better not push me too far."

"Please try to be nice to her - if you can't - at least make an attempt to be civil? We're all on the same side now."

"To tell you the truth, Angel, I don't know what side anyone's on anymore."

A few minutes later, Angel and Gunn had driven away in the rental car, and Wesley was seated uncomfortably in between Faith and Cordelia on the train. Cordelia was holding his hand posssesively and looking daggers at Faith.

Spike held out two crooked elbows.

"Shall we, ladies?"

Instead of his usual one smack, this time he got two.

Gunn saw Angel watching the trio.

"That bother you?" He asked. "Both your exes?"

"Freaks me out a little." Angel admitted. "Buffy and Darla, together in the same place? It's almost like some kind of nightmare. I hope they don't suddenly bond and start comparing notes. Speaking of girlfriends - how are you holding up?"

"Huh?" The look of shock on Gunn's face was almost comical. Angel tapped his nose.

"At the hospital. When you came in, you hadn't showered yet. She did, but you didn't. I was sure your normal scent isn't Vanilla."

"Oh yeah, your super smell thing. Kinda unnervin' to know you can do that. Yeah, I was actually with Faith on the side of findin' that bastard and beatin' him down."

"Emma wouldn't like that."

"I know." Gunn agreed. "Which is why I haven't done it yet."

******

"So what's the plan?" Darla asked. "I mean, if either of you actually has one. Or we could walk around in a circle."

"Sounds good to me." said Spike.

"Yet another graduate of Angel's University of Dumb Planning." Buffy groused. "How big is this city again?"

"LOOK!" Spike cried. "There they are!" Emma and Dawn were about 200 feet away, holding hands and standing in the middle of the sidewalk, looking terrified. "Nibblin!" He shouted, waving his arms.

The girls ran toward them.

"Are you okay?" Buffy asked.

"We're fine. " said Dawn. "Emma did this cool fighting thing that saved us from the Watchers."

Emma blushed.

"Really, it wasn't that big."

Tires screeched on the pavement as a large white van came out of nowhere and skidded to a halt. The back doors flew open and a group of Special Ops men jumped out. One of them grabbed Emma and started dragging her back to the vehicle. Another one hit Darla with a black jack, knocking her down. He grabbed her by the hair and hauled her back to her feet. Darla lashed out, but they surrounded her and tried to hold her down while one of them pulled a syringe from his pocket. Spike screamed and launched himself at them, only to fall to the ground clutching his head. Buffy ran to him, as the men began to beat him with bats and chains. She felt her stitches rip open and collapsed as she reached him. Through a haze of red, Buffy saw Darla slump in the arms of her attackers, and saw both Spike and Darla thrown into the back of the truck. Then she felt herself lifted up and placed inside. Dawn and Emma were marched around to the front and shoved into the frontseat.

******

"Did you know that *Cotswolds* is derived from the word for the stone sheep shelters or *cots* plus the word *wold* for rolling hills? That tells us about a time in the past when sheep were the mainstay of the economy. Geologically they were created from a large block of oolitic tilting up at its western end to form today's escarpment, with a gentle slope tilting to the east." Wesley explained as the train chug a chugged along.

"Oh, Lord, take me now!" Faith groaned, sliding down in her seat.

"Historically the land has been farmed for thousands of years. Flint arrowheads from the hunter gatherers of 6000 years ago have been found. Stone and Bronze age forts, the work of Neolithic man around 35, 00 BC. Am I boring you?"

"No, sweety." Cordy lied. "It's facinating."

"I think I know too much for my own good."

"You can say that again." said Faith. Seeing the hurt look on his face - "I - uh - didn't mean that the way it sounded. At all. Really."

"You don't have to be fake, Faith." Wesley said quietly. "I want you to be honest with me."

"Sorry." Faith smiled sheepishly. Wesley smiled back, relieved.

When they got to the house, Rogers greeted them with some suprise.

"Didn't expect you back so soon, Sir."

"We're just stopping on our way to meet some friends, we'll only be stopping a day or two. By the way, Rogers, has my sister arrived yet?"

"Didn't know she was supposed to be visiting."

"Thank you, Rogers."

"Shall I take your bags up to your rooms?" Wesley asked Faith and Cordelia. He knew they would never want to share.

"Aren't I going to be sharing with you?" Cordy asked coyly. Wesley's cheeks turned pink.

"Ah - um - uh - I hadn't -"

*Poor guy.* Cordy thought to herself. *You'd almost think it never entered his mind.*

Faith snickered and reached for the suitcases.

"Are you sure?" Wesley whispered to Cordelia. There was serious nervousness and aprehension in his eyes.

"Never been surer." Cordy whispered back, giving his hand an encouraging squeeze.

  
Go to Part 11a 


	12. Chapter 11 A

Rain pounded the roof of the old mansion, wind shook the window pains and   
lightning flashed in the sky. Wesley and Cordelia sat together on his bed,   
nervous and uncomfortable.  
  
"Cordelia, we don't have - um - I forgot to buy -" Wesley blushed furiously.   
"That is - I don't normally k-keep -"  
  
"Don't worry." said Cordelia. "I picked some up in the city."  
  
"Oh." Wesley took off his glasses and placed them on the bedside table. "This is   
a bit -"  
  
"Scary?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Why? We love each other, and we trust each other and we've both done this   
before."  
  
"But not together." Wesley reminded her. They both studied the oriental carpet   
as if they were experts on the Antiques Roadshow. "If you're feeling   
p-pressured, we don't have to..."  
  
"Pressured? I'm not the one who's stuttering here, pal." Cordy giggled   
nervously. "Sorry, that came out kinda mean, huh?"  
  
"I'm used to it by now. Your incredible lack of tact, I mean."  
  
"Oh, Stop!" Cordelia laughed and shoved him playfully. Wesley shoved her back   
and they ended up *play wrestling* on the bed. Cordelia was straddling him as   
Wesley lay on his back, her hands pinning his wrists to the mattress.  
  
"Well, I believe you've got me where you want me, Miss Chase." Wesley teased.   
"Please be gentle!"  
  
"Oh no, Honey, You're in for hours of horrible torture. But first, let me tell   
you my evil plan."  
  
"No! Please No! Please don't make me listen to you talk!"  
  
Cordy shifted a little and suddenly blushed.  
  
"Uh - Baby likes this game, doesn't he?"  
Wesley got flustered again.  
  
"I - I - Cordelia, if you continue to wiggle, I won't know what to do with   
myself!"  
  
"Did you want to be on top?" She asked generously. "'Cause I'm pretty much torn   
between taking charge, and making you do all the work."  
  
"Why don't we see where we end up?" Wesley suggested. Cordelia reached her hands   
down, unzipped his trousors and slipped her hand inside. An expression of   
pleased suprise crossed her face.  
  
"Helllooo Sailor..." She murmured.  
  
  
******  
Faith wandered around the house, listening to the storm outside. She hadn't   
slept through a thunderstorm since she was five and they lived in Revere and   
she'd believed her cousin Bryan when he told her the house was going to be swept   
into the Atlantic. And being a Slayer had made her a lighter sleeper, you had to   
be on your guard.  
  
She found herself in some kind of library. There were tons of books, from the   
titles they were mostly about demons and vampires. Some photo albums, Faith took   
one down and opened it.  
Pictures of Wesley's mom and dad at much younger ages, pictures of a bunch of   
people who must have been Wyndham-Pryces, they all had that same tall dark   
stuffiness about them. There were pictures of a dark haired boy, who resembled   
Wes but sturdier, with another little boy who couldn't have been anyone else but   
Wesley. In this picture he seemed about six and was missing his two front teeth.   
The other boy looked close to thirteen, Wesley was looking up at him like he was   
a god.  
  
*And one day this innoccent little boy was going to learn what it felt like to   
be tied up and stabbed with pieces of broken glass.*  
  
*And the older brother he worshipped was going to be killed by vampires one   
random night, the same vampires they were all more or less friends with now.*  
Life was wicked strange.  
  
  
"How do you feel?" Emma asked Buffy morosely.  
  
"No pain," Buffy giggled. "Lotsa druugss. Wheerrrre am I?"  
  
"The Council Infirmary. We've all been taken into *protective custody*."  
Buffy got serious.  
  
"Oh, no, oh no no no...Where's Spike? Where's Darla? Is Dawn okay?"  
"Dawn's fine. They took Spike and Darla but I don't know where."  
Buffy gestured dramatically with her hands.  
  
"Call Angel! You have to call Angel now!"  
  
"I will, I'll use the pay phone in the downstairs lobby. I can go anywhere I   
want as long as I don't leave this building."  
  
  
Spike awoke with a pounding headache, among other things. His world was dark and   
cold and his arms were pinned tightly against a hard stone wall. Spike tried to   
lift them, and discovered that his wrists were chained. The air reeked of blood   
(both demon and human) and mildew. Everything hurt, although he was healing   
rapidly from his various cuts and bruises. His internal clock told him it had   
been almost a night since the kidnapping. A door opened and a sliver of   
artificial light made a patch on the stone floor. Someone entered, male, by his   
shape and smell. The stranger avoided the patch of light, making sure that Spike   
could not see where he might be standing.  
  
"Good evening, William."  
  
"Sod off."  
  
His captor laughed, a low, deep chuckle that indicated some level of madness.  
"You are not in any position to be rude, young man."  
  
"Oh, you haven't seen rude yet. And I'm pretty sure I'm older than you."  
  
"Yes, yes, good point. Your adolescent appearance belies your true years. Very   
helpful when hunting for prey, I would assume. Lonely old women, perverted older   
men, boy crazy little girls, other teenagers, they all fell for it, didn't   
they?"  
  
"Well, yeah. "Spike admitted. "Gonna tell me what you did with my friends?"  
"Miss Summers and Miss Summers are quite safe. The elder Miss Summers is being   
treated at our infirmary for her wounds, and the younger has been taken into the   
protective custody of the Council."  
  
"And Em?"  
  
"My daughter is much safer now that I have removed her from your influence and   
the influence of her brother and his friends."  
  
"Darla?"  
  
He laughed again.  
  
"Never you mind about her. Shall we begin?" And Spike heard a rustling in the   
darkness, then the tinkling of something metal and he felt a rare shiver of   
fear.  
  
  
Wesley, Cordy and Faith met Angel at the gates to the compound.  
"PLEASE STATE YOUR PASSWORD AND EMPLOYEE ID NUMBER" A tiny speaker near the gate   
squeaked.  
  
"Blue. 8203457." Wesley recited his father's ID number, which he'd been forced   
to learn as a child in case he forgot his own. His own number had probably been   
removed from the records when he was sacked.  
  
The huge, gothic iron gates creaked open and the group passed through into the   
courtyard. The layout of the compound was bizzare, some buildings dating from   
the 13th centaury, and other buildings bieng much newer. It looked like a   
college, with students running by, arms full of books.  
  
"Emma called, from somewhere, she wouldn't say where." Wesley explained. "She   
sounded absoulutly hysterical. Saying my father had Darla and Spike. Then she   
seemed to get cut off..."  
  
"How did you know she'd be here?" Angel questioned.  
  
"Our mobile phones have Caller ID." Wesley smiled patiently. Angel looked   
embarrassed.  
  
"Still can't get the hang of these things." The vampire mumbled. "Where would he   
take them, on campus I mean? Not some place where any student or uninvolved   
Watcher might see them, right?"  
  
"There's an old training facility out in the woods." Wesley said. "It's hardly   
used at all anymore."  
  
"It's worth a shot." Angel agreed. "How do we get there?"  
  
"A dirt path, you have to walk. It's really, really not used anymore."  
"Let's go!"  
  
"Faith, would you and Cordelia see if you can find out where they might be   
keeping Buffy and Dawn? It will be in a place that's less hidden, possibly even   
the guest wing of the main building?"  
  
"Sure." said Faith. "Give me the girlie job, why doncha?"  
  
  
Blood trickled down Spike's neck. Wyndham-Pryce studied him, searching for a new   
place for his small exacto knife to cut.  
  
"Are we having fun yet?" He asked. "Are we enjoying this little taste of our own   
medicine?"  
  
"You're insane!" Spike growled. "You're a bloody nutcase."  
  
"Perhaps I am. I'll give you points for that." He smiled coldly. "If only my own   
sons had been as smart as you." He stabbed again and Spike tried not to cry out.  
"Oh, don't hold it in. It's just you and I, you don't need to be manly about it.   
Scream as much as you'd like, no one who hears will care."  
  
"Why?" Spike asked hoarsley. "I mean, I know why, but why?"  
  
"You killed my family." Wyndham-Pryce said simply. "And many many others, yet   
you have yet to experiance any consequences. There are always conseqences,   
always punishments, always room for vengence."  
Spike screamed as his torturer poured holy water over his arms. It soaked   
through the fabric of his black t-shirt and began to burn him.  
  
"AHHHHHHH!"  
  
"It seems I've cracked your unfeeling, tough exterior? The Slayer of Slayers is   
learning what it's like to be on the other side? Are you going to beg and plead   
for your life as so many of your victims did?"  
  
"You'd love that, wouldn't you. Break me, see me beg. It's fun, isn't it, that   
feeling of control? Having some helpless person at your mercy. That intoxicating   
scent of fear. The screams."  
  
"Stop that!" Wesley's father grabbed a cross off a table and pressed it to   
Spike's chest. "I'm doing this for my son. I loved him!"  
  
  
"Do you know your way around this place?" Angel asked. Wesley opened the door   
and stepped inside the dusty main corridor.  
  
"Slightly." said Wesley. "We had to come here for our physical final exams   
before graduation. An endurance test. There are dungeons in the basement,   
they've been here since the twelfth centaury, I believe."  
"Guys! Wait!" Buffy hissed. Faith was carefully helping her through the broken   
window. "You're not doing this by yourselves."  
  
"You should be resting." Angel admonished.  
  
"I'm the Slayer." said Buffy, spreading her arms out wide and wobbling a bit.   
"I'm already healed, see?"  
  
"She insisted." Faith explained as she casually put out an arm to steady her   
sister Slayer. "Short of knockin' her unconcious, I couldn't stop her."  
  
"Dawn and Em are with Cordy in the car. They're going up to the main building to   
find someone who's in charge and to get help." said Buffy. She shared a secret   
smile with Faith. "Emma can definetly handle this one."  
  
A man's scream cut through the silence of the ancient building, it came from the   
basement.  
  
"That was Spike!" Angel and Buffy said in unison. Buffy ran toward the stairs.   
The look on her face was one Angel reminded himself to ask her about later - if   
they all got through this.  
  
Angel stopped and sniffed the air.  
  
"I smell her. I smell her - she's down this hallway, and she's terrified." said   
Angel. He ran in the direction of Darla's scent and Wesley followed him.  
  
  
Spike knew he'd hit a nerve, and pushed it to his advantage.  
  
"Oh you did did you? It's always seemed to me that parents who love their   
children treat them better."  
  
"I never mistreated my children!"  
  
Spike blinked at him.  
  
"Oh, of course not. And here, silly me believed Collin when he told me that you   
beat him occasionally, made a habit out of locking him in the closet and   
regularly insulted him."  
  
"It was all done in the name of discipline. You must take a firm hand with   
children.  
  
"And then apparently taking out your frustrations and grief on your younger boy,   
well - the little brat deserved it, didn't he? The nerve of him to be born! How   
dare he insert himself into your life and attempt to grow up!"  
  
"You don't know what you're talking about!" Wyndham-Pryce shouted.  
  
"No, I don't have much first hand knowlege of your domestic situation. After   
all, I only spent a lot more time with your Collin than you did. And Darla tells   
me that Wesley still has nightmares about the closet. Cordelia has backed the   
story up and so has Angel." Spike remembered to keep his cool, it would make him   
seem like the reasonable one. "And although you've studied my family   
extensively, you really know nothing about us. If you did, you would know that   
Angelus could also be quite - tyranical at times - and I know whereof I speak   
when I speak of these situations."  
  
And add a little *William* speak to make him sound more mature.  
  
"I wanted them to be the best - I want them to be the best. There's no room for   
childhood in that. There's no room to be lax."  
  
"I know, I know." Spike said soothingly. "It's hard."  
  
"We'll pick this up later!" Wyndham-Pryce snarled, attempting to regain the   
ground he'd lost. He turned and stormed out, slamming the heavy iron door. Spike   
let out an uneeded breath and slumped against the wall.  
  
  
Angel and Wesley ran through what seemed like an endless maze of corridors. The   
whole place was like a small sparsley furnished castle, that had also once   
served time as a school. It had both combinations of horrible smells, musty,   
wet, woodsy, bloody, and also the smell of rubber erasers, bologna sandwhiches,   
sweatsocks and paint. Wesley hadn't smelled it in about four years and now it   
made him gag.  
Angel heard footsteps and pulled Wesley into an alcove. Two Watchers, both men   
in their thirties, walked by.  
"I really don't know about this." Watcher Number One said.  
"They're vampires." Number Two sounded as if he were talking to an idiot. "Two   
less makes the world a better place. All that crap about *souls* and *chips* is   
just a myth."  
  
"I feel guilty." Number One said quietly. "When I picked her up, she was so   
small, and she looked like a kid or something, and I thought - What if His   
Lordship is wrong, and they do have souls? Then I'd be a murderer!"  
  
"I think you might be too soft for this career. Maybe you should look into   
becoming a PETA volunteer or something. They're animals. Vicious, violent,   
selfish animals, that's what vampires are."  
  
"And he was so small too... I mean, someone called William The Bloody, you'd   
think he'd be bigger. But he was so little and breakable. And they look like   
each other, they look like family."  
  
"Well, if you're thinking of betraying your calling, do it now. Because when the   
sun rises today, Darla's cell will have nothing but dust on the floor. Although   
- and you didn't hear this from me, I think His Lordship's gonna keep the other   
one alive as long as possible, just for fun."  
  
They passed around the corner, still arguing. Wesley and Angel stepped out from   
the alcove.  
  
"Darla's cell will have nothing but dust on the floor." Angel murmured.  
  
"She'll be in one that's facing East then." Wesley surmised. "That's on this   
side of the building."  
  
Angel followed him as he ran in the direction of the ground floor rooms. Wesley   
got there first, and his heart sank at what he found.  
  
A heavy metal door, solid in the middle, with bars on top and bottom to provide   
a view inside. The room was large and airy, and without electric lights. Darla   
was lying on her back, chained by her ankles and wrists to the floor. The moon   
shone through the gigantic window, floor length green curtains drawn back to let   
in the most natural light.  
  
"Darla!" Angel cried. He went to break down the door and leapt back, gasping in   
agony.  
  
"The door is blessed." Darla said almost dully. "These guys think of everything,   
don't they."  
  
"That's not gonna stop me from getting you out!"  
  
"Don't be stupid, Angelus."  
  
"Darla, we're going to get you out." Wesley insisted. "How much time do we   
have?"  
  
"Oh, I don't know, about three hours." She snapped. "Please, both of you, just   
go!"  
  
"I said I'd never leave you and I meant it!" said Angel. "We have three hours,   
we'll think of something, I promise."  
  
Wesley didn't have much hope for that, he pressed his forhead against the cold   
stone and cursed his father silently.  
  
  
"What's the next step?" Spike tried to recall. "Oh - yeah. Humanize yourself to   
your captor."  
  
Wyndham-Pryce reentered the room an hour or two later, this time bearing a long   
thin stick with a wooden cross on the end. He dipped it into a bucket of holy   
water and struck Spike with it.  
  
"AHHHHHH!" The vampire screamed again. *Okay, time to save your skin.*  
  
"I had a good relationship with my father." He said. "Of course, we hardly spent   
any time together. My mother, on the other hand, I was very close to. I didn't   
have a brother or sister. Spent a lot of time by myself when I was younger. I   
liked to write poetry, although frankly, it sucked. I attended University, where   
I met Cecily for the first time. She was truly beautiful, and I had never before   
dared to speak my feelings to her." He proceeded to tell the entire story, of   
Cecily shooting him down, of running into the street in tears, of tearing up his   
poems, of meeting Drusilla, of dying. "You should be writing this down.   
Pyschology of the vampire or what have you."  
  
"I have no interest in what you have to say. Did you think you might somehow   
convince me to let you go by proving that you are just as human as I am? You're   
not. You're a demon who has no conscience, no morals, no capacity for sympathy   
yourself, why do you expect it from others?"  
  
"Because you're human!" Spike cried in frustration. "You know the difference   
between right and wrong. You do have a conscience. That's the big diff between   
humans and vampires, humans have an inclination to do good. YOU'RE human. I'm a   
vampire. Now, since I've had this chip I've learned a lot about thinking about   
others before myself. I've learned all about not doing things because you think   
you're going to get something, but doing it because you're supposed to. I've   
learned about love, and about how strong some friendships can be. I think I've   
come close to gaining back some of my humanity in the last year, and now it   
seems I'm to watch you lose yours. That is, if you ever had it in the first   
place."  
  
Wyndham-Pryce struck him again. Then he looked toward the shaft of sunlight   
streaming in through the tiny cell window.  
  
"Well, well well. It seems the sun is coming up. If you'd like to say any   
prayers for your grandmother, now would be the time to start. I know your   
particular order has some traditions. If you would like me to leave you alone   
while you do it?"  
  
"I was never very religious." Spike said reflectively. "But I would like the   
opportunity to grieve in private, if you don't mind."  
  
"You know, Angelus? I've died three times now."  
"I bet there's no one else in the world who can say that." Angel agreed. He was   
sitting cross legged on the floor, if he stretched his hand through the bars he   
could just touch her fingers. Wesley had gone to look for something to break   
down the door with.  
  
"Not even Jesus." Darla mused. "That feels wrong, that I should get to be so   
special when even Our Lord only died once."  
  
"But you're not getting crowds of people, and a trial and a place in history and   
a crown of thorns." Angel reminded her.  
  
"Yeah," Darla laughed sadly. "All my deaths have been little, private ones. No   
one saw me come in, and no one's going to see me leave."  
  
"I'm here." said Angel. "Wes is here. You're not going to be alone."  
  
"No, you don't understand. I don't even exist, I've died so many times I don't   
even think I'm the same girl anymore. When - when I'm gone, there'll be no body.   
There'll be dust, and that dust will blow away in the wind and I'll be gone   
forever, Angelus." She shook her blonde head emphatically. "And I won't be   
brought back again."  
  
"Don't say that!"  
  
"I'm tired. I've lived a long, long life, most of it on borrowed time. And I'm   
tired. Nothing changes, the world hasn't changed in 426 years. I keep living my   
lives, hoping that this one'll stick, that I can do it right this time and I   
never do."  
  
"I'll help you, when we get you out, I promise I'll help! You've been doing so   
well."  
  
"You're so good to me, Angel. Too good, considering all the ways I've screwed   
you over since we've known each other. You're my only legacy, that's why you   
need to know something..."  
  
******  
Buffy ran down the halls, trying doors and breaking down others. She found   
herself getting deeper and deeper underground, the stones on the walls looked   
older with each level she went down. Buffy heard the sound of gently lapping   
water as she passed some moss covered walls. There was a door, a wooden door   
that seemed bizzarely out of place so far underground. It was locked, so Buffy   
broke it down. The tiny room was dark, almost pitch black if not for the shaft   
of sunlight coming from one window very high up on the wall. She could see that   
it had been made into a sort of makeshift cell, complete with manacles and a   
table of sharp objects for torture.  
  
Then she saw him. Spike, chained to the wall, blood soaking through his clothes   
and covered with burns.  
  
"Spike? Spike, what happened?"  
  
"Slayer?" He mumbled weakly. The vampire tried to move, and winced, closing his   
eyes against the pain. "Oh, Bloody Hell."  
  
Buffy cast around for something to break his chains with, finally setting eyes   
on a rusty old battle axe in a dark corner. As Buffy approached him, Spike   
closed his eyes again, swallowed hard, and for the first time Buffy saw there   
were tearstains on his cheeks.  
  
"You won, Betty." Spike said hoarsely. "O'course, you 'ad a little help, but   
congratulations."  
  
Buffy swung the axe, it connected with his chains with a satisfying *clunk*.  
"What are you doing?" Spike asked after he had watched her in silence for a few   
moments.  
  
"I have no idea." Buffy admitted as his chains snapped off. Spike fell forward,   
and Buffy had to catch him to keep him from hitting the floor. "C'mon, let's get   
out of here."  
  
Arms around each other's waists, they limped up the stairs.  
  
"You're a pathetic excuse for a super hero, you know that?" said Spike. "It took   
you SEVEN WHOLE HOURS to find me."  
  
"And you're a pathetic excuse for a villain. You NEEDED me to come rescue you!"  
  
"Shut up, Slayer Come Lately."  
  
"Mr. Impotent."  
  
"Bimbo."  
  
"Loser."  
  
"Bitch."  
  
"Bastard."  
  
"Ho."  
  
"Berk!"  
  
"Oooohhh... Getting your insults from Giles now, huh?" 


	13. Chapter 11 B

Part 11b  
  
  


"Angel... I need to tell you something." Darla said urgently.

"You can tell me anything, you know that." The sun was peeking over the horizon, but still far enough away not to panic.

"Angel, we were together a long time. There's so much I should have said to you, so much I had the time to say and I never bothered. Actually, for a lot of that time I didn't know I felt this way - If I had known I would have told you sooner. Like, a hundred years sooner. But some things are just hard to say, hard to admit, especially when you're not used to certain feelings."

"Darla..." Angel said softly.

"No - let me finish. I've thought a lot about this, hell, I've had a lot of down time to do some deep thinking and I know it now. We've been Sire and Childe, Partners, Lovers, and Friends, and I know that you must love me, in some way. But I can't not tell you anymore, I need you to know that I'm in love with you. I didn't want to tell you, I was afraid you wouldn't feel the same way after all that I've done, only I've decided that that doesn't matter anymore. I don't care if you'd rather be with Buffy, if it makes you happy, then go ahead. I know I don't deserve you in the first place, I just needed to tell you."

"Oh Darla. I - Buffy and I, we're over. And I do love you, how could I not? I loved you even when I hated you. You killed me, but you gave me life. You made me who I am, but if you hadn't, think of all the people I wouldn't have been able to help. I wasn't capable of loving you before, neither one of us was and when I killed you I only did it because you were trying to hurt the woman I thought I loved. Buffy's come and gone, but for some miraculous reason, you're still with me."

"I just won't go away, huh?" Darla smiled.

"You've seen me at my best, and my very worst. You knew me better than I knew myself a lot of the time, how could I not love you?" Angel kissed his finger tips and reaching his hand through the bars, touched his fingers to hers. "See, silly?"

Darla sniffled.

"Stop it, you're going to make my mascara run."

******

Wesley was in the old gymnasium, which had once been the castle's Great Hall. Some of the huge windows were boarded up, but the pinkish purpley gold sunrise still filtered through. Dust danced in tiny fairy circles across the floorboards. Wesley's father stood staring out one of the windows.

"Dad." said Wesley.

"Wesley."

"Don't do this, please." He took a few tentative steps out onto the court.

"I'm your father, Wesley. I don't take orders and suggestions from my children. I know what's best for you and Emma, and I make the rules."

"That's right. You don't need help from anyone, do you? Self Reliance is next to Cleanliness which is next to Godliness in your eyes."

"You're being incredibly disrespectful. How dare you presume to challenge me, my son the failure?"

"I'm not a failure." Wesley spoke up, wondering where his sudden reserve of bravery came from.

"You were given two slayers to watch, and couldn't manage to keep either one in line. You've aligned yourself with a vampire. You turned your back on the Council."

"The Council turned it's back on me. They gave me a job they knew that I had not been properly trained for, they sacked me, they refused to let me come back to England, and they attacked my friends. And the fact that I can use the words *my friends* means that I'm not a failure. I'm doing something good and productive and worthwhile with my life, and I have people that I love to share that with. People who came all the way to England just so I wouldn't have to face you by myself. People who stayed here even when things got a little too hot in the kitchen, people who risked their lives to help me. And what have you done?

"Nothing.

"You sit in your office, sending little girls out to die in your place. You make up impossible rules for everyone else to follow. You drive your children too hard. You keep your daughter from having any semblance of a normal life. You tell all of us what to do and when and how to do it and you have no idea what it's actually like out there on the front lines.

"And when I brought you Collin's ashes? You never said anything. I had to kill my own brother and the most you could spare was a *Thank You*. Do you know what Angel said?

"Angel said he was Proud Of Me. The first time in my life anyone's ever said that and it wasn't you.

"And last but certainly not least, you've kidnapped two of my friends and are going to kill them. And you wonder why I have no loyalty left for you.

"And you're not going to let them go, are you? Because that would mean admitting that you made a mistake and Lord Richard Wyndham-Pryce never makes mistakes."

"Are you quite finished?" His father asked.

"I think I am." said Wesley. "I rather think that I am. Not that you were listening, of course, what would I have to say that would be at all important? So you'll probably not hear this next part either.

"I. Hate. You."

His father walked away, Oxfords creaking across the floor as he dissapeared into the darkness, leaving his son staring after him, face a mask of hurt and hate.

******

"No luck?" Angel asked as Wesley sat back down next to him. Wesley tried to conceal how shaken he really was.

"No. He refuses to listen, and I couldn't find anything to break the door down with."

"Wesley, I need to talk to you." said Darla.

"Yes?"

"I was thinking, that when I'm gone, there'll be no record of my ever having been here, not really anyway. I want to be known, I want to make a mark on the world, however small. I want to write a book."

"That's a noble idea indeed."

"But I won't have time to write it. I want you to do it."

"Darla, I'm flattered but..."

"Can you read memories?"

"I don't know how to see inside your brain."

"Yes you do." She scoffed. "It's easy. The Master was teaching me before I died. The second time. I could read your mind if I wanted to, there's no reason why we shouldn't be able to reverse it."

She motioned for him to come closer.

"Hold my hand."

Wesley did as he was told, taking grasp of her tiny, pale fingers. Darla squeezed her eyes shut and concentrated. The first memory came gently, like a suggestion creeping into his mind.

******

She had no name, the little girl. Born in a madhouse and sold to gypsies to pay her mother's bill, she spent the first four years of her life traveling the world in a garishly colored wagon. The gypsies taught her to sing and dance, and she brought them money by perfoming on stages.

******

The second memory came like a punch in the stomach.

******

The little girl, eleven or twelve, running from the people who had killed her adopted family and burned the wagons. Gypsies weren't welcome in that part of France, everyone knew they stole babies and cheated men out of their money. The little girl learns to steal, and to fight, and to fend for herself.

And when she becomes a woman...

******

The next memory almost knocked him off balance, it was like a sledgehammer between the eyes.

Turning 14, and a man sees her and says

"My, aren't you a pretty girl. Do you want to come work for me?"

And so she does.

The memories came in a torrent now, colors, sights and sounds streaming together. Wesley got all the feelings attached, learning some things he never knew, other things he had always wondered about and some things he knew she'd be ashamed to talk about if anyone had taken the time to ask.

Bleeding for the first time, the first vicious catfight, standing barefoot on the deck of a ship, salt spraying in her face, sun warming her bare arms. Bitterly cold Colonial winters, the smell of woodsmoke and animal flesh and ripening vines in the summer. Her death.

She was done, Wesley leaned against the wall, exhausted.

Buffy limped into the hallway, supporting Spike. He looked half dead, with burns and cuts all over his marble skin. They'd managed to reconnect with Faith on the way back up from the dungeons, Spike made his triumphant entrance supported by two slayers.

"Damn him!" Spike cried when he saw Darla's room. He sank to his knees in front of the door.

"Granmum?"

"Don't worry, William. I've had my time." Darla assured him.

"No!"

The sun had risen completely now, tiny flames licked at Darla's body. They danced up and down her skin like napalm as she screamed.

"No!" Tears streamed down Spike's cheeks. Angel enfolded him in his arms, rocking him back and forth like a child as he wept silently himself. Darla's screams were primal, like the sobs of her great grandchilde.

It was all over too soon, her screams were silenced and the only thing that remained of her was a small pile of ash on the floor. Wesley could still hear the echoes bouncing off the ancient walls and fought the urge to put his fingers in his ears to drown it out. Buffy somewhat hesitantly went to Spike and took him out of Angel's arms into her own. They made the transition as easily as one would pass a baby from one person to the next. Wesley put a hand on Angel's shoulder. Angel shook him off and got to his feet. He started walking, fast, and Wes almost had to run to keep up with him.

"Angel - NO!"

"Why not, Wesley?"

"It's not the way, it wouldn't be right!"

"I'll hold 'im down for yah." Faith snarled.

"I can smell him, the bastard. The fucking sadistic killer. The God Damn Fucking Piece Of -"

Angel grabbed Wesley's father by the throat, vamping out and slamming him against the wall. Angel kept screaming curses at him and slamming him into the stone.

"Angel, please! You're better than this! You're better than HIM."

Angel let him go in a gesture that said *I could care less*.

"Wes is right." He snarled. "You're not worth it."

"Faith." Wesley said quietly as she stalked toward his father. "You're better than this too."

"No I'm not." said Faith.

"Yes, you are. And you know it. However, I do have some things I'd like to say to him, so you may hold him still while I talk, if you'd like. "

"Gee, Thanks." Faith fixed the elder Wyndham-Pryce with a dangerous stare.

"First off," Wesley began. "I want Darla's ashes. All of them, and I want them now." He was aware of how quiet the hall had become, but he pressed on. "Second, My friends and I are to be allowed to leave the compound, and the country, without any trouble. No assaults, no damage to our belongings or persons, no *false reports* filed, no *accidents*. Thirdly, my friend Rupert Giles, as Active Watcher, will file a formal complaint against you with the Council for needlessly endangering TWO Slayers and the Key. And lastly, if you're planning on trying anything, Joyce Summers could always have you arrested for kidnapping her daughters. I believe I've made myself clear, do you agree, Faith, Angel, Buffy, Spike?"

"Oh, yeah." said Faith. "Wicked clear."

They turned and walked toward the door.

"Wes?" Emma panted, trotting down the corridor followed by Dawn and Cordelia. "Daddy?"

"Emma, are you alright?" Wesley asked.

"Fine. These guys at the front door told us where to find you. Wh-What happened?"

"Em -" Wesley took her aside. "Dad's done some things, he hurt Spike and killed Darla today. He's - going to pay, I've made sure of it, and he needs help and he's going to get it. You don't have to run anymore."

"Do I have to be a Watcher?"

Wesley looked back at his father, who was pale and ashen and had reddish blue marks around his throat from Angel's hands.

"Not if you don't want to."

"Good. I've been talking to Buffy and Faith, and I know what I wanna be."

******

Spike was more withdrawn than usual on the plane ride home, but some of his usual cheerfulness was starting to return. Buffy actually took a leap and sat next to him in Nabbit's plane.

"So, how many people know you play the piano?" She asked.

"Not many." Spike confessed. "It plays merry hell with me macho image."

"Ever thought of being a professional musician? You could write your own songs?"

"Nahh. I get enough people followin' me around screamin' *Hey, It's Billy Idol!*"

"I bet they say, *You look so much shorter in person that you do on tv!*" Buffy laughed. "Or, *Aren't you dead or something?*"

"Then I hafta tell them that I am dead. Then they run away and no one bothers me after that."

"I really admire that, that you don't care what other people think of you. I've always had a problem with that myself."

"What are you trying to get at, Buffy?"

"Like, how you listen to the Ramones and the Sex Pistols and you don't care that they haven't put out anything new in 16 years. That's really fascinating."

"It is?"

"Can I - uh - borrow some of your tapes or something sometime? Just so I can try and figure you out?" Buffy asked.

Spike shrugged.

"My CD collection is your CD collection."

"Cool." Buffy grinned. "Turn evil again and I won't think twice about killin' you though."

Wou'n't have it any other way." said Spike. "And ditto for you. If I ever turn evil again, you'll be the first bird I call."

"Pinky swear?"

"Pinky swear." Spike agreed.

  
Go to Part 12 


	14. Chapter 12

Epilogue  
  
  
"DON'T WANNA LOVE YOU IF YOU  
DON'T LOVE ME!  
DON'T WANNA NEED YOU IF YOU DON'T  
NEED ME TOO!"  
  


Wesley rolled over and looked at his alarm clock, then looked out his window. The sun was barely up, and it wasn't even 6 am yet. He sat up and reached blearily for his glasses. Wesley struggled to his feet and wandered out into his small hallway. The loud, obnoxious pop music was coming from the kitchen.

"DON'T WANNA TELL YOU THIS NOW  
BUT IT WOULDN'T BE RIGHT  
IF I DIDN'T TELL YOU THIS TONIGHT!"  
  


Emma bopped around the kitchen with her back to him. She had a butterknife in one hand and a piece of toast in the other. And she was singing along with the radio at the top of her off-key voice.

"Why are you up so early?" Wesley grumbled. "You're not at home, you know. No one's going to lecture you for staying in bed till a decent hour."

"Faith is coming over and we're going jogging."

"Faith. Jogging." Wesley opened a box of cereal and poured it into a bowl. Emma danced around him to open the refrigerator.

"Yes, Wesley. She wants to start training again. Not with you, of course, but she wants to start training again. " Emma gulped down a glass of orange juice. Spraying toast crumbs all over the place, she continued. "It's really neat, having aother Slayer to pal around with. Probably doesn't happen often."

"No, it doesn't." Wesley sighed. "Will you be jogging in your pajamas?"

"Oh migosh! No!" Emma gasped. She thumped her glass down on the counter and ran off to the living room to get clothes out of her suitcase. Wesley picked up a paper towel and wiped up the wet ring left on the counter by her drink. He'd get used to this new living situation. Someday. 

The doorbell rang, Wesley went to answer it.

"Hey, Wes." said Faith. "Niiicce pjs.." She waited outside the door, they stood in uncomfortable silence until Emma hopped by with one shoe on. The girls left, with a solemn promise to be back in one hour.

Wesley closed the door and went back to bed.

******

"Hows it going, you know, with your sister?" Cordelia asked when Wes went to work.

"Pantyhose on the shower rod, diet shakes in the refrigerator, pop music blasting at ungodly hours, she takes up the bathroom with her hair washing, and nail painting and leg waxing. In short, the girl is driving me mad."

"That's life with a teenage girl. "Cordelia laughed. "Regretting your desicion?"

"No." Wesley smiled. "No, I'm not. And how is Angel doing this morning?"

"He's been really quiet. "said Cordy. "He's been doing the broody, non talking thing again."

"I imagine the loss of one's Sire is quite hard."

Wesley knocked on Angel's office door.

"Yeah?" Angel said from where he sat in the dark.

"Angel, I, thought you might want someone to talk to? I-If you don't, I'll leave."

"Come on in, Wes." Angel said in a tired voice. Wesley sat down gingerly in the chair opposite Angel's desk. It made him feel like he was in his father's study, waiting to be yelled at. The scared little boy trying clumsily to comfort his grieving father and always being rebuffed. He was sure Angel would throw him out.

"I miss her too." Wesley said timidly.

"You'd think I'd be used to losing people." said Angel.

"It doesn't get easier the more it happens. In fact, sometimes it gets harder. She was a good woman."

"Yeah."

"Angel, I think this was a kind of, redemption for her, even though it hurts to think about it in that way. She had a soul, and I know it's gone on to a better place. She's earned her rest."

"I know."

"I've found a publisher for the book. If you'd like to read the draft?"

"I'd like that."

"I'll bring it in tommorrow." Wesley smiled with relief. "I want it to be accurate."

"Thanks for doing this, Wesley."

"Not a problem." Wesley left the office and closed the door behind him.


End file.
